Monday, November 16, 2020

Obama: Quickest Route to Indian Unity is Expressing Hostility Toward Pakistan

Discussion on India in President Barack Obama's memoir titled "A Promised Land" reveals what the former US President thought about India, particularly Indian hostility against Pakistan. Obama also reveals that President-elect Joseph R. Biden opposed the US Navy Seals raid to kill Usama Bin Laden in Abbottabad in 2011. Biden was Obama's Vice President at the time. 

Obama's Book Excerpts: 

“Expressing hostility toward Pakistan was still the quickest route to national unity (in India)”.  

"Violence, both public and private, remained an all-too-pervasive part of Indian life”. 

All politics and violence in India revolve around "religion, clan and caste". 

"Despite genuine economic progress, India remained a chaotic and impoverished place: largely divided by religion and caste, captive to the whims of corrupt local officials and power brokers". 

Indians take "great pride in the knowledge that India had developed nuclear weapons to match Pakistan's, untroubled by the fact that a single miscalculation by either side could risk regional annihilation".  

"(Manmohan) Singh had resisted calls to retaliate against Pakistan after the (Mumbai) attacks, but his restraint had cost him politically. He feared that rising anti-Muslim sentiment had strengthened the influence of India’s main opposition party, the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)" 

"Across the country (India), millions continued to live in squalor, trapped in sunbaked villages or labyrinthine slums, even as the titans of Indian industry enjoyed lifestyles that the rajas and moguls of old would have envied". 

“Joe (Biden) weighed in against the (Usama Bin Laden) raid (on compound in Pakistan)”

Deaths From Poor Sanitation in South Asia. Source: Our World in Data


Biden-Trump Debate: 

In his first debate with Democratic Presidential candidate Joseph R. Biden, President Donald Trump questioned India's coronavirus data while responding to Biden's accusation that his opponent has badly mishandled the pandemic. About 21 minutes into the debate, Trump said: "And, by the way, when you talk about numbers, you don’t know how many people died in China. You don’t know how many people died in Russia. You don’t know how many people died in India. They don’t exactly give you a straight count, just so you understand". 

Talking about climate change, Trump accused India of being a leading polluter. About an hour into the debate, Trump said: "China sends up real dirt into the air. Russia does. India does. They all do". There are reports suggesting India has surpassed China as the world's top polluter. Images captured by the Dutch space instrument, Tropomi, show high concentrations pollutants like Nitrogen dioxide, Ozone and other pollutants produced by car traffic, industry and power stations in India, according to a Business Insider report.

Ambassador Kishore Mahbubani on India:

"One hard truth that Indians have to contend with is that America has also had difficulty treating India with respect", writes former Singaporean diplomat Kishore Mahbubani in his latest book "Has China Won?". "If America wants to develop a close long-term relationship with India over the long run, it needs to confront the deep roots of its relative lack of respect for India", adds Ambassador Mahbubani. It's not just Mahbubani who suspects the United States leadership does not respect India. Others, including former President Bill Clinton, current US President Donald Trump, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and CNN GPS host Fareed Zakaria have expressed similar sentiments. 

Trump and Clinton:

There is some evidence to support Ambassador Mahbubani's assertion about America's lack of respect for India. For example,  ex US President Bill Clinton said in 1990s that India has a Rodney Dangerfield problem: It can’t get no respect, according to his deputy secretary of state Strobe Talbott. In a diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks in 2010, Hillary Clinton referred to India as "a self-appointed frontrunner for a permanent UN security council seat."

More recently, US President Donald Trump mocked Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi about Indian contribution to Afghanistan.  Trump said he got along very well with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, but the Indian leader was "constantly telling me he built a library in Afghanistan". "That's like five hours of what we spend... And we are supposed to say, 'oh, thank you for the library'. I don't know who is using it in Afghanistan," Trump said.

Western Media:

Indians were justifiably very proud of their great scientific achievement when the India Space Agency ISRO successfully launched the nation's Mars Mission back in 2013. The New York Times, America's leading newspaper, mocked India with a cartoon depicting the country as a dhoti-wearing farmer with his cow knocking on the door of the Elite Space Club. 

New York Times Cartoon


In an article titled "Paper Elephant", the Economist magazine talked about how India has ramped up its military spending and emerged as the world's largest arms importer. "Its military doctrine envisages fighting simultaneous land wars against Pakistan and China while retaining dominance in the Indian Ocean", the article said. It summed up the situation as follows: "India spends a fortune on defense and gets poor value for money".

After the India-Pakistan aerial combat over Kashmir, New York Times published a story from its South Asia correspondent headlined: "After India Loses Dogfight to Pakistan, Questions Arise About Its Military".  Here are some excerpts of the report:

"Its (India's) loss of a plane last week to a country (Pakistan) whose military is about half the size and receives a quarter (a sixth according to SIPRI) of the funding is telling. ...India’s armed forces are in alarming shape....It was an inauspicious moment for a military the United States is banking on to help keep an expanding China in check".

Fareed Zakaria: 

CNN GPS host Fareed Zakaria is known to be among the loudest cheerleaders for India and a sharp critic of Pakistan. While he still refuses to say anything that could even remotely be considered positive about Pakistan, it seems that he is souring on his native India.

Speaking with Indian journalist Shekhar Gupta on The Print YouTube channel, Fareed Zakaria called the Indian state an “inefficient state”.“Indian government functions very poorly, even in comparison to other developing countries. Coronavirus has highlighted that reality, " he added. He did not clearly speak about the lynchings of Indian Muslims by people affiliated with the ruling BJP and the brutality of Indian military against Kashmiri Muslims, but he did ask: “What I wonder about (Prime Minister Narendra) Modi is, is he really bringing all of India along with him? He noted sadly:”India seems like roadkill for China".

Has New Delhi's abject failure in containing the coronavirus pandemic finally done what Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's extreme brutality and open hatred against Zakaria's fellow Indian Muslims could not do? Has he really had it with Hindu Nationalist government? While he has not used his perch on CNN to do it, it appears that he has started expressing his disapproval of the performance on other platforms.

 Here are a few of the key points Fareed Zakaria made while speaking with Shekhar Gupta:

1. There’s no doubt in my mind that the Indian government, and by that I mean the Delhi government, has handled this crisis (COVID19) very poorly.

2. Indian government functions very poorly, even in comparison to other developing countries. Coronavirus has highlighted that reality.

3. In a way, India seems like roadkill for China’s obsession with absolute control over their borders. I do think there is an opportunity here for diplomacy. I don’t think India needs to be confrontational about it (the LAC issue), but of course it should push back.

4. It is now a bipolar world. US and China are way ahead of the rest of the world. For the long term, India needs to decide it’s position with China.

4. Turkey under Erdogan has become more confident and independent. It is culturally proud. It is telling Americans to buzz off.

5. Popularity of political leaders around the  world is linked to their performance on the coronavirus pandemic. In India, however, the issues of religion and caste are still dominating.

6.  What I wonder about (Prime Minister Narendra) Modi is, is he really bringing all of India along with him? How many Muslims in Indian government? Or South Indians in BJP? It is much less diverse than Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru's cabinet.

7. I have been very sad to see how Indian democracy has developed over the last few years. It has become an illiberal democracy.

8. The India media is slavishly pro-government. Self-censorship is widespread in India.

9. The Indian courts fold in cases where government takes serious interest.

Summary: 

“Expressing hostility toward Pakistan was still the quickest route to national unity (in India)”, writes former US President Barack Obama in his memoir titled "A Promised Land.  Obama goes on to add: "Violence, both public and private, remained an all-too-pervasive part of Indian life”.  Singaporean diplomat, analyst and writer Kishore Mahbubani has argued in his latest book "Has China Won?" that America does not really respect India. Others, including ex US President Bill Clinton, current President Donald Trump, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and CNN GPS host Fareed Zakaria, have expressed similar sentiments. It has become increasingly clear that India's loudest cheerleaders like Fareed Zakaria are now starting to see the stark reality of Modi's India as a big failure on multiple fronts. Indian state has failed to contain the deadly COVID19 pandemic. India's economy is in serious trouble. The country's democracy is in decline. India seems like a roadkill for China. This turn of events has created serious problems for Pakistani "liberals" who have long seen and often cited India as a successful example of "secular democracy" at work in South Asia.

Here's a video clip from CNN GPS Show:

https://youtu.be/KpAMVLwBJkM





Related Links:

Haq's Musings

South Asia Investor Review


India's Hostility Toward Pakistan

COVID19 in Pakistan: Test Positivity Rate and Deaths Declining

Fareed Zakaria Never Misses Any Opportunity to Bash Pakistan

Retired Justice Markanday Katju on Modi's India

Lynchistan: India is the Lynching Capital of the World

73 Year After Independence, Caste-Ridden India Dominated By Brahmins

Pakistan's Pharma Industry Among World's Fastest Growing

Is Pakistan's Response to COVID19 Flawed?

Pakistan's Computer Services Exports Jump 26% Amid COVID19 Lockdown

Coronavirus, Lives and Livelihoods in Pakistan

Vast Majority of Pakistanis Support Imran Khan's Handling of Covid19 Crisis

Pakistani-American Woman Featured in Netflix Documentary "Pandemic"

Coronavirus Antibodies Testing in Pakistan

Can Pakistan Effectively Respond to Coronavirus Outbreak? 

How Grim is Pakistan's Social Sector Progress?

Pakistan Fares Marginally Better Than India On Disease Burdens

Trump Picks Muslim-American to Lead Vaccine Effort

Democracy vs Dictatorship in Pakistan

Pakistan Child Health Indicators

Pakistan's Balance of Payments Crisis

Panama Leaks in Pakistan

Conspiracy Theories About Pakistan Elections"

PTI Triumphs Over Corrupt Dynastic Political Parties

Strikingly Similar Narratives of Donald Trump and Nawaz Sharif

Nawaz Sharif's Report Card

Riaz Haq's Youtube Channel

46 comments:

Singh said...

Let's set aside this strange piece from Riaz, who tries to take a mundane statement from Obama and ties it to a collage of quotes from other characters_ to make up some self-serving theme. I was wondering if all this excitement about Obama said something against India is for the same Obama who quadrupled the drone attacks on Pakistani sovereign soil, who send many ambassadors, generals, and state dept secretary to tell Pakistan they were supporters of terrorism and sent American forces into sovereign Pakistan airspace to kill OBL without bothering to inform the Pakistanis- while fully prepared to shoot down PAK planes if they interfered?

This is the guy (Obama) that Riaz is excited about for saying anti-Pakistan conversation unites India? I'd bet Indians would agree with Obama. I just don't see it as shocking.

Vivek said...

Singh, You are correct. However when historian's dissect the Afghanistan war, they will determine that Obama's pro-India anti-Pakistan stance is what lead to the partial defeat of the USA. OBL could have been killed in the 90's if the USA was more willing to work with Musharraf.

Amin H. said...

Singh, It's not about 'excitement' - it's about validation.

Pakistanis have been pointing this fact out for decades now, about how, relative to the Pakistani media and Pakistani society, anti-Pakistan hate-mongering and othering is pervasive in India, in their media, their elections, their social discourse.

The problem has been that India and its cheerleaders in the West quite successfully sold the opposite of reality, that it was Pakistan that was obsessed with an anti-India narrative, that Pakistan's media was somehow swamped with anti-India hate-mongering, our elections revolved around anti-India messaging and that Pakistan was in essence a country defined by being 'anti-India'.

The reality is that it is India, especially under the BJP, that is increasingly defining itself as a country that is anti-Pakistan and hates Pakistan.

Pointing out the reality of anti-Pakistan hate-mongering and 'othering' by the Indian government, media and society isn't 'excitement', it's a reality check for Indian cheerleaders in the West who have for so long either deliberately (because of the Don Quixotic pursuit of China containment and the rise in anti-Muslim sentiment post 9/11) or/and out of sheer ineptitude, parroted Delhi's anti-Pakistan messaging.

P.S: Most Pakistanis aren't under any illusions about Obama (and now Biden) being 'pro-Pakistan'. US Establishment candidates will continue to follow US Establishment direction on foreign policy. It's one of the reasons why Pakistanis actually liked Trump - he was willing to buck the US Establishment to a degree and extricate the US from military interventions abroad, such as Afghanistan.

The Democrats are more likely to pander to the US Establishment's demands of military interventions to 'promote and spread freedom and democracy' by massacring hundreds of thousands of innocent men, women and children in US driven conflicts abroad.

Mantou said...

Not only should India not get any respect, India deserved to be viewed by the world at large with contempt for so many reasons.

Anonymous said...

Amin, Why do you need any validation? Haven't you seen any world cup with an India vs Pakistan match? There is more at stake over there than just one match. I wonder whats the entire point about repeating that. India Pakistan unite over hate of each other. Feeling is mutual. Unless you want another validation of Sun rises in east, its a foregone conclusion.

Anonymous said...

Modern day-India, Mr Obama writes, was a "success story, having survived repeated changeovers in government, bitter feuds within political parties, various armed separatist movements, and all manner of corruption scandals".

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-54941867

But despite the thriving democracy and the freer economy, India still "bore little resemblance to the egalitarian, peaceful, and sustainable society Gandhi had envisioned". Inequality was rife, and violence "remained an all-too-pervasive part of Indian life".

Mr Obama writes that after leaving Mr Singh's residence on that November evening he wondered what would happen when the then 78-year-old prime minister left office.

"Would the baton be successfully passed to Rahul, fulfilling the destiny laid out by his mother and preserving the Congress Party's dominance over the divisive nationalism touted by the BJP?" he wonders.

"Somehow, I was doubtful. It wasn't Singh's fault. He had done his part, following the playbook of liberal democracies across the post-Cold War world: upholding the constitutional order; attending to the quotidian, often technical work of boosting the GDP; and expanding the social safety net."

"Like me, he had come to believe that this was all any of us could expect from democracy, especially in big, multiethnic, multi-religious societies like India and the United States."

But Mr Obama also found himself "asking whether those impulses - of violence, greed, corruption, nationalism, racism, and religious intolerance, the all-too human desire to beat back our own uncertainty and mortality and sense of insignificance by subordinating others - were too strong for any democracy to permanently contain."

"For they seemed to lie in wait everywhere, ready to resurface whenever growth rates stalled or demographics changed or a charismatic leader chose to ride the wave of people's fears and resentments."

Mr Obama's question was answered in 2014, when Narendra Modi led the Hindu nationalist BJP or Bharatiya Janata Party to a sweeping victory.

Mr Obama visited again in 2015 when Mr Modi was prime minister, becoming the first US President to visit India twice while in office.

But the first half of the former president's memoirs ends with with the death of Osama bin Laden in 2011.

The second part is likely to contain his impressions of Mr Modi.

Anonymous said...

Thats right keep deluding yourself like in 1971 and soon Balochistan will be independent and nwfo part of Afghanistan..

Riaz Haq said...

Obama says he had never been to India before his Presidential visit in 2010, but the country had "always held a special place in my imagination".

Spent childhood years listening to Ramayana and Mahabharata in Indonesia: Obama in Book In "A Promised Land".

"...Pakistani and Indian college friends who'd taught me to cook dahl and keema and turned me on to Bollywood movies"


https://english.mathrubhumi.com/books/books-news/spent-childhood-years-listening-to-ramayana-and-mahabharata-obama-in-book-1.5214016

Riaz Haq said...

Giving a blow-by-blow account of the Abbottabad raid by American commandos that killed the world’s most wanted terrorist on May 2, 2011 in his latest book “A Promised Land”, the former U.S. president said that the top secret operation was opposed by the then Defence Secretary Robert Gates and his former Vice President Joe Biden, who is now the President-elect.

https://www.thehindu.com/news/international/certain-elements-inside-pakistan-military-had-links-to-al-qaeda-obama-on-raid-that-killed-osama/article33114312.ece


“Based on what I’d heard, I decided we had enough information to begin developing options for an attack on the compound. While the CIA team continued to work on identifying the Pacer, I asked Tom Donilon and John Brennan to explore what a raid would look like,” Mr. Obama writes in his memoir.

“The need for secrecy added to the challenge; if even the slightest hint of our lead on bin Laden leaked, we knew our opportunity would be lost. As a result, only a handful of people across the entire federal government were read into the planning phase of the operation,” he said.

“We had one other constraint: Whatever option we chose could not involve the Pakistanis,” he wrote.

“Although Pakistan’s government cooperated with us on a host of counterterrorism operations and provided a vital supply path for our forces in Afghanistan, it was an open secret that certain elements inside the country’s military, and especially its intelligence services, maintained links to the Taliban and perhaps even al-Qaeda, sometimes using them as strategic assets to ensure that the Afghan government remained weak and unable to align itself with Pakistan’s number one rival, India, Obama revealed,” added Mr. Obama

“The fact that the Abbottabad compound was just a few miles from the Pakistan military’s equivalent of West Point only heightened the possibility that anything we told the Pakistanis could end up tipping off our target.”

“Whatever we chose to do in Abbottabad, then, would involve violating the territory of a putative ally in the most egregious way possible, short of war — raising both the diplomatic stakes and the operational complexities,” he wrote.

In the final stages they were discussing two options. The first was to demolish it with an air strike. The second option was to authorise a special ops mission, in which a select team would covertly fly into Pakistan via helicopter, raid the compound, and get out before the Pakistani police or military had time to react.

Despite all the risks involved, Mr. Obama and his national security team opted for the second option, but not before multiple rounds of discussions and intensive planning.

The day before he gave the final approval for the raid, at a Situation Room meeting, Hillary Clinton, the then Secretary of State, said that it was a 51-49 call. Gates recommended against a raid, although he was open to considering the strike option, he said.

Joe (Biden) also weighed in against the raid, arguing that given the enormous consequences of failure, I should defer any decision until the intelligence community was more certain that bin Laden was in the compound.

“As had been true in every major decision I’d made as President, I appreciated Joe’s willingness to buck the prevailing mood and ask tough questions, often in the interest of giving me the space I needed for my own internal deliberations,” Mr. Obama wrote.

After the successful Abbottabad raid, Mr. Obama made a number of calls domestically and internationally, the toughest of which he expected to be that with the then Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari, he wrote.

I expected my most difficult call to be with Pakistan’s beleaguered president, Asif Ali Zardari, who would surely face a backlash at home over our violation of Pakistani sovereignty. When I reached him, however, he expressed congratulations and support. ‘Whatever the fallout,’ he said, ‘it’s very good news. He showed genuine emotion, recalling how his wife, Benazir Bhutto, had been killed by extremists with reported ties to al-Qaeda, Mr. Obama wrote.

Ahmed said...


Sir

It is not just former President Obama, their are few sensible ,open minded and educated Indians who even admit that it is mendatory for every Indian to prove his or her nationalism or patriotism by criticising Pakistan and Pakistanis. According to Indians, the term "Nationalism" and "PATRIOTISM" is defined as "BLAME PAKISTAN AND PAKISTANIS AS MUCH AS YOU CAN".

Their is an Indian social activist girl ( I don't remember her name), even she said in a speech that "CAN INDIANS EXPLAIN OR PROVE THEIR NATIONALISM OR PATRIOTISM IF LETS SUPPOSE(MAY GOD FORBID), PAKISTAN NEVER EXISTED"?

Their was also an Indian politician(I don't remember his name also), even he said in one of his interview to an Indian TV channel that "INDIANS GIVE TOO MUCH TIME THINKING ABOUT PAKISTAN".

Anonymous said...

You see Pakistan is the only non African non civil war torn country which makes Indians look smart.

In every major exclusive club India is a member of G 20,BRICS etc it is last by miles.

Its closest allies Russia,Japan,Israel also makes it look embarrassingly backward.

As do other groupings G4 with Germany,Brazil and Japan

Quad with US,Australia and Japan etc.

So thank you Pakistan for screwing up so comprehensively that it gives us Indians a chance to gloat with facts.

Riaz Haq said...

Indian-American analyst Ashley Tellis talking with Shekhar Gupta on The Print YouTube channel:

US-India nuclear deal is one-in-a-lifetime achieving

Chinese policymakers do not believe India's goal of "strategic independence" will prevent a real alliance with US against China

India has huge advantage over China in air and on the sea

In terms of ground forces where India spends its biggest chunk of defense budget, the best India can achieve vis-a-vis China or Pakistan is a stand-off (38 minutes)

https://youtu.be/mBEL-z5_6AA

Riaz Haq said...

Anon: "You see Pakistan is the only non African non civil war torn country which makes Indians look smart"

Such self-adulation is all the proof one needs to establish that Indians are delusional.

All the peer reviewed published data shows Pakistanis have higher IQ than Indians.

And the fact is that India has the world's largest population of poor, hungry and illiterates.

India fares worse than Pakistan on World Hunger Index and UN's latest poverty statistics.

India is also the unhappiest country in South Asia while Pakistan is the happiest country in the region.

India also has much higher income/wealth inequality than Pakistan.

Ahmed said...



Anonyumous

Yes it is true that India is a member of G-20 ,Pls note that G-20 is an international forum for governments and governors of central banks of 20 major economies of the world. Pls note that according to some sources, India itself is a founding member of G-20 ,so lets suppose even if for the sake of argument we agree that Pakistan wants to join G-20, will India allow this to happen?

Pls note that their are some countries which are not members of G-20 eg. Switzerland, Singapore and many other countries. Now does it mean that India is better than these countries in terms of economy, scientific and technological advancements?

Pls check this:
https://www.lowyinstitute.org/publications/g20-outreach-and-non-g20-member-views-g20#:~:text=Together%20with%20Switzerland%2C%20these%20two,to%20enhance%20its%20regional%20representation.

Ahmed said...


Anonyoumous

With all due respect, pls note that it was the involvement of Pakistan in "WAR AGAINST TERROR" after 9/11 which opened way for the progress of India. Pls note that in 1960s,70s and 80s ,Pakistan was far better than India in terms of economy ,Aviation, development and etc. It was only after 1990s when economic reforms were introduced in India after which India started to make progress economically. Otherwise I am sorry to say in 1960s, the economic growth of India was so slow that economist use to make fun of the economy of India at that time.

The downfall of Pakistan actually started after 2008 when Gen.Musharaf completed his tenure as President. Otherwise when Gen.Musharaf was President, Pakistan was making lot of progress in different fields. In the time when Gen.Musharaf was President, economic growth of Pakistan was the fastest growing in entire Asia.



Ahmed said...


Anonymous

What is the performance of India now under BJP government? I am sorry to say India is performing so badly in diplomacy and economy that now most of the Indian people have turned against BJP government especially against PM Modi.

The economic growth of India has dropped down and is now -24 which is the lowest economic or GDP growth of India since many decades. The economy of Pakistan has not performed so good recently but never in the history of Pakistan, the economy of the country has fallen so badly that it has dropped to negative side of the graph.

In ID(Inclusive Development) index, Pakistan is mashallah ranked at position 47 and India is ranked at position 62. This index is released by WEF(World Economic Forum).

Ahmed said...


Dear Sir Riaz

Can you pls share those datas which show that the IQs of Pakistanis is higher than that of Indians?

Sir, pls check this, according to this forbes news, Pakistan is not mentioned in this survey. According to forbes, their are different ways of measuring the Intelligence(IQ) of people and nations. One of the way of measuring the intelligence of the nation is to see how many scientists,researchers and scholars in that country have achieved noble prize.

According to this survey, India is mentioned at no.18 in the list of 25 countries which has noble prize winners. India has bagged 10 noble prizes .


Ref:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/duncanmadden/2019/01/11/ranked-the-25-smartest-countries-in-the-world/?sh=4cde95ea163f

Thanks

Riaz Haq said...

Ahmad: "Can you pls share those datas which show that the IQs of Pakistanis is higher than that of Indians?"

Here's the link yo a published paper by British researchers Richard Lynn and John Harvey comparing countries'IQs on page 8:

Can you pls share those datas which show that the IQs of Pakistanis is higher than that of Indians?


http://www.iapsych.com/iqmr/fe/LinkedDocuments/lynn2008.pdf

Ahmed said...


Dear Sir Riaz

Thank you so much for sharing such useful information about the intelligence(IQ) level of Indians and Pakistanis, but Sir, can you pls throw some light on the link of forbes news that I have shared in my above comment?

I have given a link of forges website in my above comment which shows that their are total 25 countries in the world where Scientists, Thinkers,Scholars and Researchers have won noble prizes. Do you really think having higher numbers of "NOBLE PRIZE" by a specific country is one of the main pre-requisites which could determine the level of intelligence(IQ) of that country?

Doesn't this news of forbes shows that India has bagged more Noble Prizes than Pakistan, So IQ(Intelligence) of Indians could be higher than that of Pakistanis?

Sir trust me my intention is not to hurt ,but don't you think that we must be honest with ourselfs and others?

Thanks

Riaz Haq said...

Ahmad: "Do you really think having higher numbers of "NOBLE PRIZE" by a specific country is one of the main pre-requisites which could determine the level of intelligence(IQ) of that country?"

There's no link between IQ and Nobel Prizes.

US has the highest number of Nobel Prizes but it ranks 28th in IQ rankings.

Similarly, North Koreans have average IQ of 106 but they have zero Nobel Prizes.

High IQ doesn't necessarily translate into high creativity.

High IQ alone doesn't guarantee anything. It takes a lot of education, organization, and investment to produce top research.

Even the people with highest levels of intelligence and creativity require high-quality education, research facilities and basic infrastructure to produce results.

Ahmed said...


Dear Sir

Thank you for such great response, I agree, that just IQ(Intelligence) is not everything.

But Sir isn't their a relation between "IQ" and "CREATIVITY"?

I mean isn't their a directly proportional relation between "IQ" and "CREATIVITY"? The greater the IQ will be the greater will be creativity and vice versa?

Regards,

Riaz Haq said...

Ahmads: "isn't their a relation between "IQ" and "CREATIVITY"?"


Please read this:

"So intelligence matters, it demonstrates your ability to gather knowledge and effectively use it. Creativity is the ability to go beyond the intelligence frame and capitalize on seemingly random connections of concepts.

In conclusion: expert creatives don’t need to be more intelligent than the average person. They simple do three things more diligently than anyone else: they have more experiences, they think on their experiences more often, and when they start pursuing potential outcomes to problems or projects they simply work more with the ideas they come up with (whereas everyone else gives up after evaluating just one or two possible ideas, or by letting their inner critic prevent them from exploring more)."

https://creativesomething.net/post/41103661291/the-relationship-between-creativity-and

Ahmed said...

Dear Sir Riaz

I am mashallah happy with the education that I am taking but what really upsets us is the mismanagement at University level which creates problem, mashallah the courses which are offered and the teachers and professors who are teaching are mashallah all very good.

Thanks

Riaz Haq said...

#India’s #Economy to Struggle With Effects of #CoronaVirus Through 2025. #IMF predicts #Indian #GDP will shrink 10.3% in the year to March 2021 as #Modi’s sudden #lockdown paralyzed activity. #BJP #Hindutva https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-11-19/india-s-economy-to-struggle-with-effects-of-virus-through-2025

https://twitter.com/haqsmusings/status/1329575202204782595?s=20

HSBC Holdings Plc said India’s potential growth could drop to 5% in the post-pandemic world from 6% on the eve of the outbreak and more than 7% before the global financial crisis.

“All supply-side factors feel the effect, with only human capital’s contribution unchanged from the pre-virus baseline,” Kishore said. “Capital accumulation takes the biggest hit because we expect balance-sheet stresses to worsen following the crisis, lengthening the investment recovery cycle.”

-------------

India will be worst-affected among the world’s major economies even after the pandemic wanes, with output 12% below pre-virus levels through the middle of the decade, according to Oxford Economics.

Balance sheet stress that had been building before the coronavirus outbreak will probably worsen, Priyanka Kishore, head of economics for South Asia and South-East Asia, wrote in the report. She projects potential growth for India at 4.5% over the next five years, lower than 6.5% before the virus.

“It’s likely that headwinds already hampering growth prior to 2020 -- such as stressed corporate balance sheets, elevated non-performing assets of banks, the fallout in non-bank financial companies, and labor market weakness -– will worsen,” she said. “The resulting long-term scars, probably among the worst globally, would push India’s trend growth substantially lower from pre-Covid levels.”

The contraction hasn’t deterred Prime Minister Narendra Modi from reiterating his target of making India a $5 trillion economy by 2025 from $2.8 trillion. While the government has announced a slew of measures to support growth, they have fallen well short of expectations to boost demand, leaving the central bank to do much of the heavy-lifting. A paper published by the Reserve Bank of India last week predicted Asia’s third-largest economy has entered a historic technical recession. Official data is due Nov. 27.

The International Monetary Fund predicts GDP will shrink 10.3% in the year to March 2021 as Modi’s sudden lockdown paralyzed activity. While a sharp rebound is forecast as economic activity resumes, there are lingering scars.

Ghazi said...

The biggest symbol of Indian obsession is the sheer number of them on Pakistani forums, news sites and even social media content about Pakistan. It is understandable that people might be curious, but those with outright hatred towards us are obsessed by us.

Look at this forum, of the Indian membership how many positively engage and how many are trolls? How many Pakistani's do you find on their forums? Next to none.

Look at the news sites. Dawn's comments section is inundated with Indians, yet how many Pakistani's comment on ToI?

Their national identity is fabricated, which in itself is no bad thing. Most nations are a mix of cultures, ethnicities, religions and political identities. However the HUGE discrimination and inequality in their nation makes it very difficult for people to bind to a national identity. Thus we have the hatred of Pakistan - the glue that binds. The "other" who is behind all the problems.

Mantou said...

"Their national identity is fabricated, which in itself is no bad thing. Most nations are a mix of cultures, ethnicities, religions and political identities. However the HUGE discrimination and inequality in their nation makes it very difficult for people to bind to a national identity. Thus we have the hatred of Pakistan - the glue that binds. The "other" who is behind all the problems."

Well said.

Ahmed said...


Sir Mantou

Thank you for your comment,as far as I know or think the reason why India doesn't have a national identity is because India is a secular country.Could secularism be another factor which deprives Indians from becoming a nation?

Unfortunately in India, they don't just have religious discrimination in India but they also have racial discrimination, according to some recent articles which were written by Africans who have personally visited India have shared their experience of living in India for some times. Their are some african students in India who have faced racial discrimination.

Also unfortunately their is wide spread caste system which divides the Hindu community within itself making Barhmans a high class(elite class) but on the other hand having "Dalits" as lower caste of Hindus.According to me this could be another reason why Indians can't become a nation.

Ahmed said...


Sir Ghazi

I agree with you ,but don't you think they have love for their country as these same Indians who belong to different caste, creed, race and culture unite against Pakistan during cricket matches which take place between India and Pakistan and they also unite against Pakistan when India is at war with Pakistan? So how do you explain and describe this unity during such occasions? Is their a uniting force within Indian society which unites them against Pakistan during wars and cricket matches or it is simply the same hatred which you have mentioned above which unites these Indians?

Regards,

Riaz Haq said...

The World Bank links one in ten deaths in India to poor sanitation. From contaminated groundwater children pick up chronic infections that impair their bodies' ability to absorb nutrients. Almost 44m children under five, says the bank, have stunted growth, and every year over 300,000 die from diarrheal diseases.

https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2017/09/24/why-it-is-so-hard-to-fix-indias-sanitation

Riaz Haq said...

#India’s #Economy Shrinks Sharply as #COVID19 Slams it. #China has come roaring back, #US , #Europe & Japan are finding their feet but

India’s economy shrank 7.5% last quarter on top 24% decline in previous quarter. #Modi #BJP #Hindutva |The New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/27/business/economy/india-economy-covid-19.html

“India was expected to really step into China’s shoes and give that additional boost to globalization that was missing,” said Priyanka Kishore, head of South Asia at Oxford Economics. “And that’s where India didn’t really play out the role it was largely expected to play, and that role seems to be diminishing more and more.”

------------------




An estimated 140 million people lost their jobs after India locked down its economy in March to stop the outbreak, while many others saw their salaries drastically reduced, the Mumbai-based Center for Monitoring Indian Economy said. As the lockdown was eased, many went back to work, but more than six million people who lost jobs haven’t found new employment.

In a June survey by the All India Manufacturers Organization, about one-third of small and medium-sized enterprises indicated that their businesses were beyond saving. The industry group said that such a “mass destruction of business” was unprecedented.

-------

Just a few years ago, India, with a population of 1.3 billion people, was one of the world’s fastest-growing large economies. It regularly clocked growth of 8 percent or more.

Global businesses began to warm to the idea of India as a potential substitute to China, both as a place to make goods and to sell them. China’s costs are rising, and its trade war with the United States has complicated doing business there. The Chinese Communist Party is increasingly intruding into business matters, and local Chinese competitors have upped their game against international brands.

But India’s economy was facing headwinds well before the pandemic. Between April and December 2019, G.D.P. grew only 4.6 percent.

-------

One of Mr. Modi’s policies, called demonetization, banned large currency notes overnight in an effort to crack down on tax avoidance and money laundering. Under another, India replaced its welter of national and state taxes with a single value-added tax, in part to cut down on corruption among tax collectors.

Mr. Modi also increasingly turned India’s industrial policy inward, which many economists say has hurt overall growth. The country has long nurtured some of the steepest trade barriers of any major economy, to help its domestic industries develop. Mr. Modi added to that in areas like electronics. His government has also tightened rules around e-commerce, to assist Indian businesses that compete with companies like Amazon and Wal-Mart.
“The slowdown,” said Ms. Kishore, “is almost homegrown.”

Riaz Haq said...

#Indians' national dream of emulating #China’s rapid growth is receding — by some #economic yardsticks, #India can’t even keep up with #Bangladesh. #Modi’s #COVID19 #lockdown in March left millions of scared migrant workers without jobs, shelter or food. https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2020-opinion-india-and-modi-are-losing-china-battle/
By Andy Mukherjee

-------------------

The post-lockdown economy will simply not have enough demand to consume what can be produced. There’s some attempt to reform the supply side — labor and farm markets, in particular. But not much is being done to revive demand, either in the short or the long run. Some of us are wondering if this callousness will cause India’s demographic dividend — two out of three Indians are still in the magic age group of 15 to 64 years — to go unclaimed.

-------------

China’s example beckoned. After the June 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, Beijing wouldn’t brook political freedoms, but the economic reforms begun by Deng Xiaoping were deemed irreversible and foreign investors were mostly welcomed. The economy took off. China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001 and grew at 10%-plus rates for 20 years.

It was never going to be easy for India to emulate its neighbor, whose single-party state struck a bargain with foreign investors, while discriminating against its own business class. Such stratagems weren’t possible in India’s noisy, federal democracy. Politicians couldn’t ignore local businesses that gave them money to fight elections. So India cleaned up the stock market and opened it to overseas investors. This made sense. Unlike China, which was saving more than half of its national income before the 2008 global financial crisis, India lacked the capital to sustain a liberalizing economy through messy cycles of coalition politics, let alone to build the roads, power plants and other basics of missing infrastructure.

So we put our faith in institutions. Our heritage of English common law, independent courts and regulators held the promise of fairness and protection for all stakeholders, and we thought these would get stronger over time. The state, we hoped, would shrink as an economic player, and become a more robust referee. Governance would improve, endemic corruption would recede. The anonymity fostered by urbanization would smash the regressive caste system. We liked it when scholars such as Yasheng Huang, a professor at MIT Sloan School of Management, said that India could overtake China.

To me and many of my generation, Manmohan Singh was a savior, someone who carried the scars of partition and had known poverty as a child. He was one of us. Our disillusionment with him was 20 years in the future.

----------------------

---
Then, in November 2016, Modi performed a high-voltage stunt: He outlawed 86% of the country’s cash, presumably to unearth illicit wealth. People queued up for days to return their worthless notes. New currency was in short supply. Small businesses in my hometown — a shoe-making hub — couldn’t pay workers. Women-run micro enterprises on the outskirts of Mumbai later told me that their going rate for weaving golden threads into a sari crashed to 4,000 rupees ($54), from 7,000 rupees.

------------
The rest of the economy is still highly informal, and inefficient: 80% of the output of farms and by small businesses goes to pay for capital, which is scarce. Labor’s share is 20%. Workers are liberally rewarded only in a bloated public sector, much of which ought to have been privatized long ago. Because it wasn’t, taxpayers have to keep alive debt-addled firms such as Air India Ltd.

-------------

The push toward higher wages should have come from higher farm productivity, which would have raised the price of migrant labor coming to cities. India missed this page of the East Asian playbook and failed to create a permanent urban working class.

Riaz Haq said...

An unidentified #illness has hospitalized more than 300 people in southeastern #India, including one who has died. #AndhraPradesh #disease https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/07/asia/india-mystery-illness-intl-hnk-scli/index.html


"All patients have tested negative for Covid-19," said Roy, adding that about 180 patients have now been discharged, while the rest are "stable." The patient who died had reported similar symptoms to the others, but then had a fatal but unrelated cardiac arrest, she said.

--------

Patients in the city of Eluru, in the state of Andhra Pradesh, reported a range of symptoms including seizures, loss of consciousness and some nausea over the weekend, said Dolla Joshi Roy, the district surveillance officer of Eluru's West Godavari District.
This comes as India continues to battle the Covid-19 pandemic, with the world's second-highest number of infections. Andhra Pradesh is one of the worst-affected states, and currently has more than 800,000 confirmed cases.
But Covid-19 wasn't the cause of the mass hospitalizations over the weekend.


Riaz Haq said...

Wistron violence could sour #Apple's 'Make In India' plans. Thousands of workers angry over non-payment of wages, destroyed equipment and vehicles at a Wistron plant in southern #India, causing an estimated $60 million in damages. #Modi #MakeInIndia https://reut.rs/3npyHyy

Violence at a Wistron Corp factory in southern India is likely to stall the company’s and its client Apple Inc’s drive to expand local manufacturing, while forcing the government to redouble efforts to encourage foreign investors.


The Taiwanese company, one of Apple’s top suppliers, had been hiring in significant numbers at the plant that became operational earlier this year.

It assembled the second-generation iPhone SE there and was expected to start producing newer models, but the violence has led the company to shut the site and file a police complaint against more than 5,000 contract workers for destruction of property.

Wistron has not disclosed details, but one source familiar with the situation, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the area where smartphones are assembled and lines where delicate components, such as printed circuit boards, are mounted, have been damaged.

The company did not respond to a request for comment from Reuters. It said in a regulatory filing in Taiwan that it was doing its best to get the plant running again.

Apple also did not respond to a request for comment.

Two sources close to the situation, who asked not to be named because they were not authorised to speak to the press, said restarting could be difficult.


Riaz Haq said...

#Modi has overcome protests of #Indian #Muslim & #Kashmiris with heavy-handed crackdowns and nationalist appeals but the #FarmersProtests will not be so easily subdued. #India's efforts to dismiss protests by farmers as “anti-national” are falling flat. https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2020/12/modis-nationalism-cant-quell-the-farmers-protest/617448/


The standoff between India’s government and its farmers began in September following the passage of new regulations designed to open up the country’s enormous agricultural sector to private investment (a move that would enable farmers to sell directly to companies instead of to the government marketplace, which guaranteed a minimum price for certain crops). Although the authorities have framed the reforms as necessary to modernize India’s farming industry, which employs more than half of the country’s 1.35 billion people and is rife with mismanagement and waste, many farmers fear that the changes will ultimately drive down crop prices, devastating their livelihoods.

Those fears have prompted tens of thousands of farmers, predominantly from the northern states of Punjab and Haryana, known as India’s “food bowl,” to set up makeshift barricades of tractors and trailers across roads, railway lines, and highways leading to New Delhi. More than 450 farmers’ unions and organizations expressed their support in a nationwide strike, and the protests have attracted the backing of opposition lawmakers and other high-profile figures.

Perhaps because of this widespread support for the farmers, to say nothing of their size as a voting bloc, Modi’s government has felt inclined to tread carefully in its handling of the demonstrations. In addition to relenting on its initial crackdown, which resulted in clashes between farmers and police, the government agreed to enter into negotiations with the protest’s leaders (an offer that was never extended to those protesting the government’s more nationalist policies).

But some habits die hard, and many within the government opted to revert to familiar tactics. One minister claimed that the farmers’ protest had nothing to do with agriculture at all and was instead being infiltrated by “leftist and Maoist elements.” Other leaders branded them as “goons” and “anti-nationals.” Senior officials in Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party claimed that the farmers were “Khalistanis,” in reference to the Sikh separatist movement (India’s Sikh community is largely concentrated in Punjab). Some even attempted to discredit the protests by alleging that the participants weren’t real farmers because they eat pizza.

Framing them as ignorant at best—and traitorous at worst—echoes the divisive and nationalist language that the Indian government has previously deployed against peaceful protesters, including those who demonstrated against the government’s citizenship law last year. Where Modi is seen to be enacting his nationalist agenda, the government can easily dismiss critics as simply being “anti-nationals,” particularly when it comes to issues on which the prime minister enjoys widespread support.

-------------

“They are extremely disciplined because they know the art of political negotiation,” Kaur said. “These farmers’ unions and workers’ unions are resourceful, and they have also been extremely careful in making sure that the focus always remains on these demands and not be sidetracked by anything else.”

With the farmers prepared to protest for as long as it takes, there is no easy way out. For Modi, there is no nationalist fix this time.

Riaz Haq said...

#UK Govt Body Slaps £20,000 Fine on #India's Republic #Bharat for 'Hate Speech Against Pakistanis'. Worldview Media Network Ltd will also need to broadcast a statement of Ofcom’s findings and is barred from repeating the program in the UK. https://thewire.in/media/uk-govt-body-slaps-20000-fine-on-republic-bharat-for-hate-speech-against-pakistan via @thewire_in

British TV regulatory authority Ofcom has imposed a £20,000 fine on Republic Bharat, Republic TV’s Hindi channel, for hate speech against Pakistani people in a programme broadcast last year.

Ofcom, which stands for Office of Communications, is the government-approved regulatory and competition authority for the broadcasting, telecommunications and postal industries of the United Kingdom

In a detailed note on its decision, Ofcom said that Republic Bharat’s Poochta Hai Bharat programme – the evening primetime show hosted by Arnab Goswami – had failed to comply with its broadcasting rules.

According to Ofcom, an episode, shown on September 6, 2019, featured “comments made by the host and some of his guests that amounted to hate speech against Pakistani people, and derogatory and abusive treatment of Pakistani people. The content was also potentially offensive and was not sufficiently justified by the context.”

At the time, the atmosphere was charged with Pakistan’s critical reaction to India taking away Jammu and Kashmir’s special status and breaking up the state into two Centrally-ruled UTs. But the regulator did not accept this as an extenuating circumstance.


By the time the episode aired, Ofcom had already notified Republic that it had been receiving a number of complaints on content broadcast by it in relation to “highly pejorative references to members of the Pakistani community (e.g. continually referring to them as “filthy”)”.

Worldview Media Network Limited, the licensee which airs Republic Bharat in the UK, will also need to broadcast a statement of Ofcom’s findings and is barred from repeating the programme in the UK.

The show under the scanner was a 35-minute discussion that hinged upon India’s Chandrayaan mission but sought to encompass a larger narrative on how India was advanced in space science and its neighbour Pakistan, was not.

Among participants were Major Gaurav Arya, Maj General K.K. Sinha, Prem Shukla of the BJP, and Omar Inam and Omar Altaf from Pakistan. A third Pakistani guest remained unidentified by Ofcom, and according to the transcription, was largely unable to get a word in.

“The host and the Indian guests dominated the discussion, with the Pakistani guests attempting to respond but largely being shouted down by the presenter and Indian guests,” Ofcom’s note says.

From the discussion which was often chaotic enough to flummox the transcriber, Ofcom gleaned that “statements were made which implied not just that there are threats to Indian interests and citizens from particular people and groups inside Pakistan, but that all Pakistanis represent a terrorist threat to Indians and others.”

The statements made in the show by guests, and including the host Goswami, said Ofcom,

“conveyed the view that all Pakistani people are terrorists, including that: “their scientists, doctors, their leaders, politicians all are terrorists. Even their sports people”; “every child is a terrorist over there. Every child is a terrorist. You are dealing with a terrorist entity”. One guest also described Pakistani scientists as “thieves”, while another described Pakistani people as “beggars”.”

Riaz Haq said...

#Femicide, #rapes, culture of #violence make #India the worst country for #women. #India is the worst followed by war-torn #Afghanistan (2nd), #Syria (3rd). #Modi #Hindutva #Misogyny https://www.business-standard.com/article/current-affairs/femicide-rapes-culture-of-violence-make-india-the-worst-country-for-women-118062700112_1.html

India is perceived as having the worst record for sexual violence, harassment from cultural and traditional practices and human trafficking, meaning it is now considered the least safe country in the world for women.

These are the findings of a global perception poll carried out by Thomson Reuters Foundation, a charity, which surveyed 558 experts on women’s issues in order to assess nations on overall safety for women.

A failure to improve conditions has led to India becoming the most dangerous country for women; it was fourth in 2011, the last time the poll was conducted.

India is ahead of war-torn Afghanistan (2nd), Syria (3rd) as well as Somalia, a country that ranks significantly lower on human development indices, on overall perception of threats to women’s safety.

India is the only country to feature in the top five rankings for each of the six categories looked at by the poll, never registering lower than the fourth place.

“When only 10% of women in India own land compared to 20% globally, femicide rates are the highest in the world, there are 37 million more men than women in the Indian population, and 27% girls are married before the age of 18 – also the highest rate in the world- you begin to understand the reality in India,” Monique Villa, chief executive officer, Thomson Reuters Foundation, told IndiaSpend.

“India is still fighting the deep-rooted patriarchal mindset, which sees women as inferior in the world’s biggest democracy,” Villa added.

Cases of sexual violence against women and minors in India made international headlines in 2018 with the high-profile case of eight-year-old Asifa in Jammu and Kashmir’s Kathua district, and the gang rape of anti-trafficking activists in Jharkhand.

The government has responded with harsher penalties for rapists and death penalty for child rapists but this may, in fact, deter reporting of rapes, IndiaSpend reported on May 2018.

A deteriorating situation

“India tops the list with levels of violence against women still running high, more than five years after the rape and murder of a student on a bus in Delhi sparked national outrage and government pledges to tackle the issue,” The Thomson Reuters Foundation report, released on June 26, 2018, said.

When the poll was conducted in 2011, India was ranked fourth overall, better only than Afghanistan, Congo and Pakistan.

Its ranking was primarily attributed to high instances of female foeticide and infanticide, and human trafficking.

Seven years later, the 2018 poll shows India has been ranked as the most dangerous country for women on three significant issues:

Sexual violence: including domestic rape, lack of access to justice in rape cases, sexual harassment and coercion into sex as a form of corruption;
Cultural & religious practices: including female genital mutilation, child and forced marriage, physical abuse and female infanticide/foeticide; and
Human trafficking: including domestic servitude, forced labour and forced marriage

Riaz Haq said...

From Indian analyst Pravin Sawhney:

"Most Indian military analysts deep seated poison, hatred, prejudices & negativity for Pak & its military harms India. Without much positivity (for clear thinking) they are unable to grasp Chinese warfare & Pak’s risen geopolitical status!"


https://twitter.com/PravinSawhney/status/1366563793250127874?s=20

Riaz Haq said...

#India's Supreme Court Chief Justice tells accused #rapist to marry victim to avoid jail. Man is accused of stalking, tying up, gagging and repeatedly raping the girl and threatening to douse her in petrol, set her alight and have her brother killed.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/mar/04/indias-top-judge-tells-accused-rapist-to-marry-victim-to-avoid-jail

India’s abysmal record on sexual violence has been a focus of international attention since the 2012 gang-rape and murder of a student on a Delhi bus. Victims are regularly subjected to sexist treatment at the hands of police and courts, including being encouraged to marry their attackers in so-called compromise solutions.

The letter drew attention to another hearing on Monday during which Bobde reportedly questioned whether sex between a married couple could ever be considered rape. “The husband may be a brutal man, but can you call the act of sexual intercourse between a lawfully wedded man and wife as rape?” he said.

The letter by the rights campaigners said: “This comment not only legitimises any kind of sexual, physical and mental violence by the husband, but it normalises the torture that Indian women have been facing within marriages for years without any legal recourse.”

Marital rape is not a crime in India. Bobde has not responded to the criticism.

His predecessor Ranjan Gogoi was the highest-profile figure in India to face a #MeToo complaint after he was accused by a former staffer of sexual assault. He was cleared in 2019 after an in-house inquiry, prompting protests in the country.

Riaz Haq said...

Father arrested in #India for beheading his 17-year-old daughter. Sarvesh Kumar, a #Hindu, was arrested as he was walking toward a police station in Hardoi district In #UP on Wednesday night, carrying the severed head of his daughter. #honorkilling - CNN

https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/05/india/father-beheads-daughter-india-intl-scli/index.html

Police in India's northern Uttar Pradesh state have arrested a man who confessed to beheading his teenage daughter.

Sarvesh Kumar was arrested as he was walking toward a police station in Hardoi district on Wednesday night, carrying the severed head of his 17-year-old daughter.
"He was making his way on foot to the police station to confess what he had done," a spokesperson for Hardoi Police told CNN on Friday.
Indian court rules in favor of female journalist sued for defamation over sexual harassment allegations
Indian court rules in favor of female journalist sued for defamation over sexual harassment allegations
"He told police he had seen his daughter with a young man that he believes she was seeing, which made him angry as he was against it," the spokesperson added.
As Kumar, a vegetable seller from Pandetara village, made the one-mile walk from his home to the police station, local passersby alerted the police, who stopped him and began to film him.
During this time, according to the police spokesperson, Kumar told authorities about his daughter's relationship, saying he had found her alone at home, locked her in a room and severed her head using a knife.
Indian priest and 'disciples' arrested for alleged gang rape and murder of woman
Indian priest and 'disciples' arrested for alleged gang rape and murder of woman
"Considering the situation, he was calm. He wasn't crying or hysterical. When the policemen were speaking to him, they asked him to place his daughter's head on the ground and to sit down, which he listened to without arguing back," the police spokesperson told CNN.
Kumar is currently in custody where he continues to be questioned, the spokesperson added. A list of charges will be compiled once the investigation has been completed. He will have access to a public lawyer once he has been formally charged, and he will remain in custody until the trial, police said.

Riaz Haq said...

Female workers at H&M supplier in #India allege widespread sexual violence. Multiple #women at Natchi Apparels have reported abuse weeks after 21-year-old worker was allegedly killed by her supervisor. #misogyny #violence #rape #Hindutva #Modi https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/mar/09/female-workers-at-hm-supplier-in-india-allege-widespread-sexual-violence

Women in India making children’s clothes for H&M have spoken out about widespread sexual violence they claim to have faced at one of the company’s suppliers in India.

The allegations come just weeks after the body of Jeyasre Kathiravel, a 21-year-old Dalit garment worker, was found in a field close to her family home after she failed to return from her shift at the Natchi Apparels factory in Tamil Nadu.

Kathiravel’s supervisor has been charged with her murder. Her family and colleagues at the factory claim she was too afraid to report harassment they say she faced from her supervisor in the weeks before she died.

Since the killing, 25 women have made allegations to the Tamil Nadu Textile and Common Labour Union (TTCU) of sexual assault, harassment and verbal abuse by male supervisors and managers at Natchi Apparels, owned by one of India’s largest garment manufacturers, Eastman Exports.

Workers at Natchi Apparels making clothes for H&M and other brands, who spoke to the Guardian on condition of anonymity, claimed that female workers faced persistent sexual violence and verbal abuse in the workplace.

They described a working environment in which male supervisors wielded “total power” over the women beneath them. One said that “even married women are not safe. It is just that [abuse] and production targets. We are nothing more to the factory.”

Another said sexual violence had been going on for years. “It happens a lot on the night shift.”

Riaz Haq said...

As extreme #poverty returns, #India sees surge in #child #slavery. Among many gains lost to the #COVID-19 #pandemic, child labour shows resurgence, worsened by inadequate rescue efforts. #Modi #BJP #Hindutva #Islamophobia_in_india https://aje.io/y7puts via @AJEnglish

Across the rural countryside in states such as Bihar that rank low on the Human Development Index, as families strained against widespread loss of livelihoods, India’s already fatigued child-protection mechanisms found more and more children rendered vulnerable to trafficking.

The government of India confirmed that the financial year 2020-21 recorded a small rise over the previous year in the number of children rescued from illegal work.

Children in destitute families are more vulnerable to trafficking than ever.



-----------

When 13-year-old child labourer Shashikant Manjhi died in May 2020, his body could not be transported to his family’s brick-and-mud home in the eastern state of Bihar, 1,126km (700 miles) from Rajasthan state’s Jaipur, where the boy had worked for over a year.

Lockdown restrictions made it impossible, explained the policeman who telephoned the news of the death to the boy’s family, promising to cremate the child respectfully.


Days later, Shashikant’s mother Sahuja Devi conducted the final rites of her last-born on an open field a few hundred metres away from their home. She used a doll fashioned out of paddy husk to represent the child she was consigning to the flames.

In one of a handful of telephone conversations, her son had told her he was bone-tired from placing sequins, stones and glitter on metal bangles for 14-15 hours a day. He was yearning to return.

“For weeks, his employer would not let him speak to us on the phone,” Sahuja told Al Jazeera, seated on the mud floor of her house.

She was stirring a large, blackened aluminium pot of rice that would be lunch for five adults and six children, with a tiny cup of watery dal.


Flies hovered over a small bowl of chopped bittergourd beside the wood-fired mud hearth.

Then her eldest son Mithilesh, 30, took ill and the family needed cash. They managed to get Shashikant on the phone.

“Photan said he would convince his employer to send money,” said Subbidevi, Mithilesh’s wife, using the whimsical name given to Shashikant by the employer.

“Photan’s money didn’t come, only the call came announcing his death.”

No cause of death was given. The family had no way of knowing if the body bore injuries, but they suspected that the child may have insisted upon money being wired home and been injured in an ensuing scuffle.

The employer was in a Jaipur jail briefly, they said, and subsequently released.

In Bhimpur Tola where they live, adjoining Sondiha village and 32km (20 miles) from the nearest town of Gaya, even getting more information would have meant an expensive day trip to Konch police station, 13km (8 miles) away.

“There wasn’t a rupee at home. Unless Photan sent us money, we had nothing,” said Subbidevi.

Shashikant was one of tens of thousands of trafficked child labourers who continued to work during the coronavirus lockdown, their traffickers and employers accustomed to ducking the law enforcers.


Riaz Haq said...

In an interview with conservative host Tucker Carlsen, UPenn Professor Amy Wax said the following about Indian-Americans: "They're taught that they are better than everybody else because they are Brahmin elites and yet, on some level, their country is a sh*thole".

Prof Amy Wax of the University of Pennsylvania Law School alleged that “Blacks” and “non-Western” groups have “a tremendous amount of resentment and shame against western people for [their] outsized achievements and contributions.” “Here's the problem. They're taught that they are better than everybody else because they are Brahmin elites and yet, on some level, their country is a sh**hole,” Wax, who has a long history of racist remarks, said.

She also said that the westerners have outgunned and outclassed the Asian Americans in every way.

“They've realized that we've outgunned and outclassed them in every way… They feel anger. They feel envy. They feel shame. It creates ingratitude of the most monstrous kind,” she said.

https://youtu.be/ehrLmrFDmuk

Riaz Haq said...

#Spain's La Vanguardia newspaper uses #snake charmer's picture to show #India's #economy. Angry #Indians condemn it as "racist caricaturing". #Modi #BJP #Hindutva #hunger #poverty #LaVanguardia https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/spains-newspaper-uses-snake-charmer-s-pic-to-show-india-s-economy-internet-react-101665752381998.html

https://twitter.com/haqsmusings/status/1580977010028867585?s=20&t=NOTWDkF0OV41EzRjmVGQkA

A Spanish newspaper, La Vanguardia, has triggered an online storm after its front page featured a caricature of a snake charmer while reporting about the Indian economy. The article titled ‘The hour of the Indian Economy’ was published with the caricature.

Several Indians, including Nithin Kamath, who is the CEO of Zerodha, have slammed the Spanish newspaper.

Calling out La Vanguardia, Kamath tweeted, "Quite cool that the world is taking notice, but the cultural caricaturing, a snake charmer to represent India, is an insult. Wonder what it takes for this to stop; maybe global Indian products?"

Author Rajat Sethi wrote, "'The hour of the Indian economy," says La Vanguardia, a leading Spanish daily on its cover page. While the world is taking notice of India’s economic prowess, their racist caricaturing of Indian snake charmer continues unabated. Meanwhile, other Twitter users also called out the daily."

"Arguably India is still a very poor country. Leave the top 10 per cent of the population aside, the rest of India lives in miserable conditions. Until the time that changes, it is pointless to feel bad about such caricaturing. How the world perceives us, stems largely from how we actually are," a user wrote.

"How come it's an insult? Maybe it's our shortcoming that they don't see India more than that," another user tweeted.

Riaz Haq said...

Imran Khan's Party Uses Old PM Modi Clip To Target Pak PM.


https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/pm-narendra-modi-imran-khan-pakistan-shehbaz-sharif-imran-khans-party-leaders-are-sharing-an-old-clip-of-pm-modi-heres-why-3696073

An old video of a speech by Prime Minister Narendra Modi is trending across the border. Leaders of Imran Khan's party, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf, are sharing a clip of PM Modi to slam the Shehbaz Sharif government over Pakistan's financial crisis.
The video shows PM Modi's speech in Rajasthan's Barmer during his campaign for the 2019 general election. "We destroyed Pakistan's arrogance, forced them to go around the globe with a begging bowl," the Prime Minister says.

He also refers to Pakistan's threats of a nuclear attack and says: "We have stopped fearing Pakistan's threats. If they have nuclear weapons, ours are hardly kept for Diwali."

Riaz Haq said...

Javed Akhtar says 'religion does not make a nation', cites Pakistan's example: 'Arre jab woh nahi bana sake...'

https://www.hindustantimes.com/entertainment/bollywood/javed-akhtar-on-hindu-rashtra-religion-does-not-make-a-nation-it-s-not-a-strong-enough-glue-101677309960333.html

The Bollywood writer-poet had recently attended a festival in Pakistan and has since been the centre of a fresh controversy. Told that all Indian believe that all Pakistanis are terrorists, Javed said that Pakistan continues to nurture the perpetrators of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks. While Pakistani celebs have slammed him, Indians, including celebrities and politicians, are praising him for the statement.

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Javed Akhtar questions the rationality behind creating nations based on religion and cites Pakistan as an example of failed attempt to do so.

Javed Akhtar has lashed out at extremists demanding a 'Hindu rashtra' and said the British made a similar attempt - to create nations based on religions - but failed miserably. He was talking about the creation of Pakistan at a Mumbai event when he made the statements. (Also read: Javed Akhtar calls Kangana Ranaut ‘unimportant’ after she praised him)

At an ABP event in Mumbai, Javed Akhtar was asked if the formation of Pakistan was a mistake, in hindsight and he said, “If a book were to be written about 10 blunders that human beings have made, the creation of Pakistan would certainly figure in it. It was illogical, unreasonable, but alright...now it is a reality, we have to accept that. But, it was not right, it was very illogical - religion does not make a nation, it is not enough of a glue. If it was, the whole of Middle East would have been one nation, whole of Europe would have been another country. Today, the day you start excluding, you will keep on taking out the layers of the onion to find the real onion, (but won't find anything). There (in Pakistan), Ahmedaiyas and Shias are no longer considered Muslims. That exclusion continues, but what have we learnt from them?”

He added, "Today, we are doing what they did 70 years ago - you want a Hindu Rashtra. Arre wo (Pakistan) nahi bana sake, duniya nahi bana saki aap kya bana lenge (they could not do it, the world could not, what will you create)? I do not know what a Hindu Rashtra is, I do not know what is a country based on religion is."

The Bollywood writer-poet had recently attended a festival in Pakistan and has since been the centre of a fresh controversy. Told that all Indian believe that all Pakistanis are terrorists, Javed said that Pakistan continues to nurture the perpetrators of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks. While Pakistani celebs have slammed him, Indians, including celebrities and politicians, are praising him for the statement.

Riaz Haq said...

Modi uses speech to Russia-China-led group to swipe at Pakistan, avoids mentioning Ukraine

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/vladimir-putin-ap-narendra-modi-india-russia-b2369003.html

India’s prime minister on Tuesday took a veiled swipe at rival neighbor Pakistan and avoided mentioning the war in Ukraine while addressing a group of Asian countries led by China and Russia

India’s prime minister on Tuesday took a veiled swipe at rival neighbor Pakistan and avoided mentioning the war in Ukraine while addressing a group of Asian countries led by China and Russia.

In his opening speech to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said the group should not hesitate to criticize countries that are "using terrorism as an instrument of its state policy."

"Terrorism poses a threat to regional peace and we need to take up a joint fight,” Modi said without naming Pakistan. India regularly accuses Pakistan of training and arming insurgent groups, a charge Islamabad denies.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Pakistan Prime Minister Shebaz Sharif are scheduled to address the day-long virtual summit.

Modi also warned of global challenges to food, fuel and fertilizer supplies. Trade in all three has been disrupted by Russia's 14-month-long war in Ukraine, but SCO members have largely avoided direct mention of the war.

Putin is participating in his first multilateral summit since an armed rebellion rattled Russia, at one of the few international grouping in which he enjoys warm relations with most members.

For Putin, the summit presents an opportunity to show he is in control after a short-lived insurrection by Wagner mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin.

The Shanghai Cooperation Organization is a security grouping founded by Russia and China to counter Western alliances from East Asia to the Indian Ocean. The group includes the four Central Asian nations of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, all former Soviet republics in which Russian influence runs deep. Pakistan became a member in 2017, and Iran, which is set to join on Tuesday. Belarus is also in line for membership.

The United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in a message to the summit that it was taking place amid growing global challenges and risks. "But at a time when the world needs to work together, divisions are growing, and geopolitical tensions are rising.”

"These differences have been aggravated by several factors: diverging approaches to global crises; contrasting views on nontraditional security threats; and, of course, the consequences of COVID-19 and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine,” he said.


This year’s event is hosted by India, which became a member in 2017. It’s the latest venue for Prime Minister Narendra Modi to showcase the country’s growing global clout.

Days after his return from a high-profile visit to the United States, India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday had a telephone conversation with Putin about the recent developments in Russia, India’s External Affairs Ministry said.

Modi reiterated calls for dialogue and diplomacy between Russia and Ukraine, ministry spokesman Arindam Bagchi said.

India has avoided condemning Russia for its war on Ukraine and abstained from voting on U.N. resolutions against Russia.