tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post8424497750468957940..comments2024-03-27T15:36:44.737-07:00Comments on Haq's Musings: Female Genocide Unfolding in IndiaRiaz Haqhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comBlogger45125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-82484528600351544352021-09-07T09:32:36.867-07:002021-09-07T09:32:36.867-07:00#Drought-stricken state of #MadhyaPradesh: Minor g...#Drought-stricken state of #MadhyaPradesh: Minor girls paraded naked in #India 'rain ritual'. "We believe that this will bring rains," #Indian media quoted a women in the procession as saying. #Modi #BJP #Hindutva https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-58461751<br /><br /><br />Six minor girls in central India were stripped and paraded naked as part of a village ritual to summon rains.<br /><br />The incident took place in a drought-parched village in the Bundelkhand region of Madhya Pradesh state.<br /><br />Videos that went viral on social media reportedly showed young girls walking naked with a wooden shaft on their shoulders which had a frog tied to it.<br /><br />Locals believe the ritual will appease the rain god and bring rainfall to the region.<br /><br />India's National Commission for Protection of Child Rights has sought a report from the administration of Damoh district, where the village is located.<br /><br />The Madhya Pradesh police said they had not received any formal complaint against the event, but added that they had opened an investigation.<br /><br />"Action will be taken if we find the girls were forced to walk naked," Damoh superintendent of police DR Teniwar told news agency Press Trust of India.<br /><br />The video shows the girls, some of them reported to be as young as five, walking together in a procession, followed by a group of women singing hymns.<br /><br />The procession stopped at every house in the village and the children collected foodgrains, which were later donated to the community kitchen of a local temple.<br /><br />"We believe that this will bring rains," PTI quoted a women in the procession as saying.<br /><br />Damoh district collector S Krishna Chaitanya said the girls' parents had consented to the ritual and had even participated in it.<br /><br />"In such cases, the administration can only make the villagers aware about the futility of such superstition and make them understand that such practices don't yield desired results," he added.<br /><br />Indian agriculture largely depends on monsoon rains and in many regions, there are rituals devoted to rain gods depending upon local customs and traditions.<br /><br />Some communities hold yagnas (Hindu fire rituals), others marry frogs or donkeys or take out processions singing songs in praise of the rain gods.<br /><br />Cynics say the rituals merely distract ordinary people from hardship, but cultural experts say the practices are a measure of desperation in those who believe there is nowhere else to turn for help.<br /><br />Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-41043610772143351282017-03-06T07:27:29.810-08:002017-03-06T07:27:29.810-08:00BBC News - #India abortion: Police find 19 #female...BBC News - #India abortion: Police find 19 #female foetuses. #gender #Genocide<br />http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-39176668<br /><br />Police in the western Indian state of Maharashtra have found 19 aborted female foetuses near a hospital.<br />Senior police officials in Sangli district said the remains were "buried with the intention of disposing them".<br />The police told the BBC that they found the foetuses while they were investigating the death of a woman who had undergone an illegal abortion.<br />Activists say the incident proves yet again that female foeticide is rampant in India despite awareness campaigns.<br />The police said that the woman had died in a "botched abortion", and they were looking for the foetus near a local hospital when they made the grisly discovery.<br />"It appears to be an abortion racket. We have arrested the husband of the woman, and have launched a manhunt for the doctor who has gone missing," Dattatray Shinde, superintendent of police, told the BBC.<br />Similar cases have come to light in the past.<br />Eight female foetuses were found in 2012 in a plastic bag near a lake in Indore city in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh.<br />In June 2009, 15 female foetuses were found in drains in Maharashtra's Beed district.<br />Dr Ganesh Rakh, who campaigns to save the female child and appeared in the BBC's Unsung Indians series, said the recent case proves that illegal sex determination and abortion was still practised in India.<br />"This is horrifying. Female foeticide is happening at the scale of a genocide in India. This case proves that people still prefer boys and girls are still unwanted," he said.<br />"I think abortions were happening on a large scale in Sangli. Once the doctor is arrested, I fear we will find more aborted female foetuses."<br />Sex-selective abortion and sex-determination tests are illegal in India, where there is a widespread social preference for boys.<br />Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-87717274817705495232015-10-22T22:34:12.040-07:002015-10-22T22:34:12.040-07:00US Stars push #India's Daughter, shocking docu...US Stars push #India's Daughter, shocking documentary of #Delhi gang rape & murder of Jyoti Singh, into awards race http://gu.com/p/4dh93/stw<br /><br />Banned by the Indian authorities, Leslee Udwin’s harrowing documentary India’s Daughter has been endorsed by some of Hollywood’s biggest names before its US release on Friday and is tipped for Oscars success.<br /><br />India's Daughter review – this film does what the politicians should be doing<br />This documentary, which focuses on the assault of Jyoti Singh on a bus in Delhi in 2012, may not contain much that will surprise Indians, but its determination to shed light on the country’s rape crisis should inspire change<br />Read more<br />Udwin’s film centres on the gang rape and murder of 23-year-old Jyoti Singh, which sparked protests across India and caused worldwide outrage. The hour-long documentary features interviews with Singh’s bereaved parents, as well as a number of the accused rapists and their families. Four of the six men charged with sexual assault and murder have been sentenced to death by the Delhi high court.<br /><br />Last week, Meryl Streep introduced India’s Daughter at a New York event, proclaiming she was on the campaign to get Udwin’s film nominated for a best documentary Oscar. “When I first saw [the film] I couldn’t speak afterwards,” Streep said.<br /><br />Along with Freida Pinto, Streep was also present at the film’s US premiere in March, a week after the film was screened by the BBC in Britain.<br /><br />On Tuesday in Los Angeles at the Paley Center for Media in Beverly Hills, Sean Penn also threw his support behind the film.<br /><br />Introducing India’s Daughter, Penn said that the film is by no means pleasant to watch, but vital to experience. “I was never sure that films are important – until last week,” he said.<br /><br />Comparing Udwin’s film to an MRI, Penn added: “It made me ponder manhood. It reminded me of a trip I took with my children many years ago to Tanzania. I remember saying to our guide how extraordinary it was to see a culture last the way it had been for a thousand years. And the guide said to me: ‘Don’t wish the static upon anyone. It will kill them.’”<br /><br />During a post-screening discussion moderated by educationalist Ken Robinson, Udwin thanked Streep and Penn for their work to promote the film, but stressed that the support she has received in India is more meaningful. A photo showing a rape protestor holding a placard that read “Thank You Leslee” especially moved her, she said.<br /><br /><br />India’s Daughter: ‘I made a film on rape in India. Men’s brutal attitudes truly shocked me’<br />Read more<br />The documentary was to have initially aired on an Indian television station during International Women’s Day in March, but a court order halted the broadcast. According to Indian authorities, it was done in the interest of maintaining public order.<br /><br />The film is still banned from playing in India, but after it aired on BBC earlier in the year, it went viral on the internet, attracting a huge audience in India.<br /><br />Addressing the ban, Udwin said: “I think it’s fair to say that any country that thinks it can ban a film in the digital age should see a psychiatrist.”<br /><br />She added, however, that she pays a company to try and keep India’s Daughter from being shared illegally on the internet: “I am a law-abiding human being and the film is banned in India, where I have been threatened by prosecution. And frankly, I love India and I want to go back there.” Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-37012401318815244602015-07-27T16:11:49.093-07:002015-07-27T16:11:49.093-07:00Cast and gender in India
In 1993, two constitutio...Cast and gender in India<br /><br />In 1993, two constitutional amendments established a 33 percent minimum quota for women in village and district councils. And in 1996, the Women’s Reservation Bill (WRB) was introduced to extend that quota to the lower house of the Indian Parliament and all state legislative assemblies.<br /><br />Nineteen years later, the bill is still pending. Critically, the most powerful opposition to the WRB has come from OBC and Dalit parties, which fear that quotas for women would limit the lower castes’ newfound political power. For many, caste identification is stronger than gender identification, and the women’s movement has long been criticized for being overly focused on the concerns of upper-caste women and insufficiently sensitive to the problem of caste.<br /><br />Some critics assert that in basing political representation on caste, India has made caste identity inescapable. Upward social movement does not change caste identity; an individual who improves his or her economic status is still marked by his or her caste.<br /><br />Although quotas have opened up the possibility of political representation—and even higher education—for some lower-caste individuals, they have not brought about increased equality in the social sphere. Caste persists in the social realm in part because caste identity is the path to political recognition and power. And as long as caste identity is the key to political recognition, the pernicious social aspects of caste will continue to define Indian society.<br /><br />At the end of the debate in the Constituent Assembly that approved the Indian constitution in 1950, Ambedkar warned, “We are going to enter a life of contradictions. In politics, we will have equality, and in social and economic life, we will have inequality.… We must remove this contradiction at the earliest possible moment, or else those who suffer from inequality will blow up the structure of political democracy which this assembly has so laboriously constructed.”<br /><br />Indian democracy has not blown up. But Ambedkar’s contradiction persists, and the caste foundation of India’s political structure maintains the hierarchy at the root of the country’s tremendous inequality of status and condition.<br /><br />Much of the careful thought of the 19th-century reformers and the founding generation has been shunted aside by the force of caste-based politics on the one hand and capitalist materialism on the other. The political principles on which the Indian state is founded have not been sufficient to create an inclusive, egalitarian society.<br /><br />Although the post-independence generation of Congress politicians promoted a secular vision of the Indian nation, they did not pursue the kinds of reforms that might have brought social reality closer to their political ideal. In doing so, they opened the way for the ascendance of caste-based politics and, ultimately, the more reactionary rise of religion in politics.<br /><br />Hindu nationalism, with its dual focus on cultivating traditional social practices and providing social services afforded neither by the state nor economic growth, would seem to provide the strongest alternative to a modern capitalist society.<br /><br />But Hindu nationalism itself has adapted to India’s increasing wealth. The upper castes, particularly the Brahmins, once prided themselves on simple, even ascetic, living; they now hold up material success as another sign of caste superiority. The traditional Hindu elite is no longer distinguishable from the modern economic elite.<br /><br />http://www.newsweek.com/modis-india-caste-inequality-and-rise-hindu-nationalism-356734Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-36981227105575467772015-06-18T08:12:04.390-07:002015-06-18T08:12:04.390-07:00Little girls bear the brunt in #India's viciou...Little girls bear the brunt in #India's vicious cycle of malnutrition. Half are stunted #gendergap http://reut.rs/1N5dPEz via @ReutersIndia<br />Despite India's economic boom over the last two decades, 46 percent of its children under five are underweight, 48 percent are stunted and 25 percent are wasted, according to the latest government figures.<br /><br />Child malnutrition is an underlying cause of death for 3 million children annually across the world - nearly half of all child deaths - with most dying from preventable illnesses like diarrhoea due to weak immune systems, according to the United Nations Children's Fund.<br /><br />Those lucky enough to survive, grow up without enough energy, protein, vitamins and minerals, causing their brains and bodies to be stunted which means they cannot fulfill their physical, academic or economic potential.<br /><br />The problem of malnutrition starts well before birth in countries such as India, where there are high rates of child marriage, despite the age-old practice being illegal.<br /><br />About 47 percent of women aged between 20 and 24 were married before the age of 18 in India, according to the latest government figures.<br /><br />The custom hampers efforts to improve women's status, as it cuts across every part of a girl's development and creates a vicious cycle of malnutrition, poor health and ignorance, gender experts say.<br /><br />A child bride is more likely to drop out of school and have serious complications during pregnancy and childbirth. Her children are more likely to be underweight and may be lucky to survive beyond the age of five.Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-60005692452918143262013-08-08T17:48:21.238-07:002013-08-08T17:48:21.238-07:00Here's an Aljazeera story on 60 million missin...Here's an <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/07/201372814110570679.html" rel="nofollow">Aljazeera story</a> on 60 million missing Indian women:<br /><br /><i> It has been nearly seven months since a young student was gang-raped in the New Delhi, India, and died from her horrific injuries 13 days later on December 29, 2012. The fast-track trial of the accused men has just re-started and the sentence is due any day now.<br /><br />When thousands of Indians took to the streets to protest the inability of the establishment to protect women, they demanded not just a change in the law but in people's attitudes. But the watershed moment that many Indians hoped for doesn't seem to have arrived. And that may be because most Indians don't even recognise the extent of the problem in their own country.<br /><br />Let's start with a figure: 60 million. That is nearly the entire population of the United Kingdom. That is also the approximate number of women "missing" in India. They have either been aborted before birth, killed once born, died of neglect because they were girls, or perhaps murdered by their husband's family for not paying enough dowry at marriage.<br /><br />That number isn't a wild exaggeration or a figure thoughtlessly plucked out of the air, but a matter of demographics. As far back as 1991, the economist Amartya Sen pointed out that Asia was missing 100 million women because of sex-selection and the poor attention paid to women. In 2005, it was estimated at 50 million Indian women in the New York Times. But this isn't a new problem.<br /><br />In 1991, the Indian census showed an unprecedented drop of women in the sex-ratio. After running tests to check whether women had been under-counted, they found that a massive explosion in sex-selection during the 80s had led to a sharp drop in the number of girls being born. A report by Action Aid in 2009 ("Disappearing Daughters" [PDF]) found that in some villages in the state of Punjab, there were as few as 300 girls for every 1,000 boys.<br /><br />Overall, India had 37.25 million fewer women than men according to the 2011 Census. To match the sexes equally and then increase the number of women to match the natural sex-ratio would require around 60 to 70 million women. That is the number of women missing. This phenomenon cannot be called anything less than genocide.<br /><br />So why isn't there more recognition of this mass tragedy? In my recently released e-book India Dishonoured: Behind a Nation's War on Women, I show that many Indians don't want to recognise the problem because it has become deeply ingrained in the culture....</i><br /><br />http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/07/201372814110570679.htmlRiaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-43001439568589332032013-01-01T22:01:11.774-08:002013-01-01T22:01:11.774-08:00Here's a NY Times Op Ed on a woman's exper...Here's a <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/02/opinion/the-unspeakable-truth-about-rape-in-india.html" rel="nofollow">NY Times</a> Op Ed on a woman's experience of living in Delhi:<br /><br /><i>I LIVED for 24 years in New Delhi, a city where sexual harassment is as regular as mealtime. Every day, somewhere in the city, it crosses the line into rape. <br /><br /> As a teenager, I learned to protect myself. I never stood alone if I could help it, and I walked quickly, crossing my arms over my chest, refusing to make eye contact or smile. I cleaved through crowds shoulder-first, and avoided leaving the house after dark except in a private car. At an age when young women elsewhere were experimenting with daring new looks, I wore clothes that were two sizes too large. I still cannot dress attractively without feeling that I am endangering myself.<br /><br />Things didn’t change when I became an adult. Pepper spray wasn’t available, and my friends, all of them middle- or upper-middle-class like me, carried safety pins or other makeshift weapons to and from their universities and jobs. One carried a knife, and insisted I do the same. I refused; some days I was so full of anger I would have used it — or, worse, had it used on me.<br /><br />The steady thrum of whistles, catcalls, hisses, sexual innuendos and open threats continued. Packs of men dawdled on the street, and singing Hindi film songs, rich with double entendres, was how they communicated. To make their demands clear, they would thrust their pelvises at female passers-by.<br /><br />If only it was just public spaces that were unsafe. In my office at a prominent newsmagazine, at the doctor’s office, even at a house party — I couldn’t escape the intimidation.<br /><br />On Dec. 16, as the world now knows, a 23-year-old woman and a male friend were returning home after watching the movie “Life of Pi” at a mall in southwest Delhi. After they boarded what seemed to be a passenger bus, the six men inside gang-raped and tortured the woman so brutally that her intestines were destroyed. The bus service had been a ruse. The attackers also severely beat up the woman’s friend and threw them from the vehicle, leaving her to die.<br /><br />The young woman didn’t oblige. She had started that evening watching a film about a survivor, and must have been determined to survive herself. Then she produced another miracle. In Delhi, a city habituated to the debasement of women, tens of thousands of people took to the streets and faced down police officers, tear gas and water cannons to express their outrage. It was the most vocal protest against sexual assault and rape in India to date, and it set off nationwide demonstrations. <br />----------<br /> The volume of protests in public and in the media has made clear that the attack was a turning point. The unspeakable truth is that the young woman attacked on Dec. 16 was more fortunate than many rape victims. She was among the very few to receive anything close to justice. She was hospitalized, her statement was recorded and within days all six of the suspected rapists were caught and, now, charged with murder. Such efficiency is unheard-of in India.<br /><br />In retrospect it wasn’t the brutality of the attack on the young woman that made her tragedy unusual; it was that an attack had, at last, elicited a response. </i><br /><br />http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/02/opinion/the-unspeakable-truth-about-rape-in-india.htmlRiaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-1638300566703633382012-12-29T20:13:57.125-08:002012-12-29T20:13:57.125-08:00Here are ten reasons why India has sexual violence...Here are ten reasons why India has sexual violence problems according to a <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2012/12/29/india-rape-victim-dies-sexual-violence-proble/" rel="nofollow">Washington Post</a> blog:<br /><br /><i>1. Few female police: Studies show that women are more likely to report sex crimes if female police officers are available. India has historically had a much lower percentage of female police officers than other Asian countries. ...When women do report rape charges to male police, they are frequently demeaned.<br /><br /><br />2. Not enough police in general: There aren’t enough police dedicated to protecting ordinary citizens, rather than elites, a Brookings article argues, and the officers that are available often lack basic evidence-gathering and investigative training and equipment:<br /><br /> <br />3. Blaming provocative clothing: There’s a tendency to assume the victims of sexual violence somehow brought it on themselves. In a 1996 survey of judges in India, 68 percent of the respondents said that provocative clothing is an invitation to rape. In response to the recent gang-rape incident, a legislator in Rajasthan suggested banning skirts as a uniform for girls in private schools, citing it as the reason for increased cases of sexual harassment.<br /><br />4. Acceptance of domestic violence: The Reuters TrustLaw group named India one of the worst countries in the world for women this year, in part because domestic violence there is often seen as deserved. A 2012 report by UNICEF found that 57 percent of Indian boys and 53 percent of girls between the ages of 15 and 19 think wife-beating is justified. <br /><br />5. A lack of public safety: Women generally aren’t protected outside their homes. The gang rape occurred on a bus, and even Indian authorities say that the country’s public places can be unsafe for women. Many streets are poorly lit, and there’s a lack of women’s toilets, a Women and Child Development Ministry report said recently. ...<br /><br />6. Stigmatizing the victim: When verbal harassment or groping do occur in public areas, bystanders frequently look the other way rather than intervene, both to avoid a conflict and because they — on some level — blame the victim, observers say. <br /><br />7. Encouraging rape victims to compromise: In a recent separate rape case, a 17-year-old Indian girl who was allegedly gang-raped killed herself after police pressured her to drop the case and marry one of her attackers.<br /><br />Rape victims are often encouraged by village elders and clan councils to “compromise” with the family of accused and drop charges — or even to marry the attacker. Such compromises are aimed at keeping the peace between families or clan groups...<br /><br />8. A sluggish court system: India’s court system is painfully slow, in part because of a shortage of judges. The country has about 15 judges for every 1 million people, while China has 159. A Delhi high court judge once estimated it would take 466 years to get through the backlog in the capital alone.<br /><br />9. Few convictions: For rapes that do get reported, India’s conviction rate is no more than 26 percent. There is also no law on the books covering routine daily sexual harassment, which is euphemistically called “eve-teasing.” The passing of a proposed new sexual assault law has been delayed for seven years.<br /><br />10. Low status of women: Perhaps the biggest issue, though, is women’s overall lower status in Indian society. For poor families, the need to pay a marriage dowry can make daughters a burden. India has one of the lowest female-to-male population ratios in the world because of sex-selective abortion and female infanticide. Throughout their lives, sons are fed better than their sisters, are more likely to be sent to school and have brighter career prospects. </i><br /><br />http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2012/12/29/india-rape-victim-dies-sexual-violence-proble/Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-12511717510112870012012-12-29T09:03:35.026-08:002012-12-29T09:03:35.026-08:00Here's a NY Times blog post on brutal rape and...Here's a <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/30/world/asia/india-rape-delhi.html?_r=0" rel="nofollow">NY Times</a> blog post on brutal rape and death of a woman on a New Delhi bus:<br /><br /><i><br /> The woman, who has not been identified, has become of a symbol for the treatment of women in India, where rape is common and conviction rates for the crime are low. She boarded a bus with a male friend after watching a movie at a mall, and was raped and attacked with an iron rod by the men on the bus, who the police later said had been drinking and were on a “joy ride.”<br /><br />She died Saturday morning in Singapore, where she had been flown for treatment after suffering severe internal injuries during the assault. She had an infection in her lungs and abdomen, liver damage and a brain injury, the Singapore hospital said, and died from organ failure. Her body was flown back to India on Saturday.<br /><br />As news of her death spread Saturday, India’s young, social-network-savvy population began to organize protests and candlelight vigils from Cochin in Kerala to the outsourcing hub of Bangalore to the country’s capital. Just a tiny sliver of India’s population can afford a computer or has access to the Internet, but the young, educated part of this group has become increasingly galvanized over the Delhi rape case. ...</i><br /><br />http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/30/world/asia/india-rape-delhi.html?_r=0<br />------<br />Here's <a href="http://blogs.reuters.com/india/2012/12/27/abhijit-mukherjees-foot-in-mukh-moment-steals-spotlight-from-rape-cases/" rel="nofollow">Reuters' story</a> on the rape incident:<br /><br /><i>India is angry. India is protesting. Rallies continue in New Delhi after the gang rape of a 23-year-old girl on Dec. 16. The rapes continue too. On Wednesday night, three men reportedly raped a 42-year-old woman and dumped her in South Delhi. There are more cases being reported every day.<br /><br />The biggest story in India, however, is Abhijit Mukherjee’s comment about the Delhi protests — “These pretty women, dented and painted, who come for protests are not students. I have seen them speak on television, usually women of this age are not students”. He added that students, who go to discotheques, think it is a fashion statement to hold candles and protest.<br />---------<br />Are such comments by lawmakers rare? Why are we so sensitive to something that anyone, anywhere in India says? There were similar reactions when Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi called Human Resource Development Minister Shashi Tharoor’s wife a 50-crore-rupee girlfriend. A few days ago, Sanjay Nirupam’s comment about a fellow politician — Till some time ago you were dancing on the TV screens and now you have become a psephologist — freaked people out. And let’s not forget the case of the impromptu “theek hai?” on the part of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh earlier this week. It threatened to become bigger than “mission accomplished.”<br /></i><br /><br />http://blogs.reuters.com/india/2012/12/27/abhijit-mukherjees-foot-in-mukh-moment-steals-spotlight-from-rape-cases/<br /><br />Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-39838653566878378632012-12-28T22:31:18.563-08:002012-12-28T22:31:18.563-08:00Here are some excerpts of a piece titled "How...Here are some excerpts of a piece titled "How's India Doing (2012)?" as published in <a href="http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/how-is-india-doing-2012/article4249630.ece" rel="nofollow">The Hindu</a>:<br /><br /><i> One, the decline in poverty has not been uniform across regions and communities. If in 1982 your parents lived on the banks of the Cooum in Madras or in Dharavi in Bombay, it is likely that today your economic status is better than theirs. But if you are from a Dalit or adivasi family in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Bihar, or Uttar Pradesh, chances are that you are no better off now than your parents were in 1982. Two, the benefits of growth have indeed trickled down, but that is exactly what has happened: it has been just a trickle. The incidence of poverty has declined, but a quarter of the population or around 300-350 million people are still desperately poor. Three, if other basic necessities like shelter, access to clean drinking water and sanitation are included, the picture is much more dismal. Research by R. Jayraj and S. Subramanian shows that severe “multidimensional poverty” afflicted 470 million in 2005-06, not much lower than the estimate of 520 million in 1992-93. Four, in certain critical areas — for instance, malnourishment and maternal mortality — conditions remain terrible. Close to half our children suffer from malnutrition, much the same as 30 years ago.<br /><br />So if we paint a broader picture, the old sliver of the beneficiaries of India’s growth has only thickened a bit. For the large mass of India’s poor, daily life remains a struggle. There is no doubt India lost a major opportunity in the past three decades.<br /><br />---<br /><br />The sex ratio has at last begun to see some improvement, though only in the past decade. And the life expectancy of women is now, as it should be, longer than of men. But we are in a far worse situation than in 1982 with respect to the status of the girl child. The sex ratio at birth — the number of girls born for every 1,000 boys born — has declined in recent decades. And the sex ratio of children under six has also worsened. Whether the result of sex-selection at birth, female infanticide, or neglect of the girl child, India has become an awful place for girls.<br /><br />---<br /><br />The outcome, however, has not been any major improvement in the economic status of the deprived castes. It may be too early to express any definite opinion on the achievements of these parties, but the early optimism that they would position the demand for lower-caste rights as part of a larger movement for justice and equality has faded. These parties have at times turned into movements solely for the advancement of sectional interests, and, worse, have become vehicles of personal aggrandisement.<br /><br />If these are the changes in four areas that Sen examined in 1982, one also has to recognise that major changes have taken place in other areas. <br />---------<br /> For a country that became independent amid gruesome violence on religious lines, communalism has been no stranger. Soon after Sen’s essay, we had the anti-Sikh riots of November 1984. Mass murder was conducted over three days in the capital under the benign gaze of a new Prime Minister. The message was: if you mobilise yourself with force, you can get away with anything. The message was heard, and put into practice in Bhagalpur 1989, Bombay 1993, and Gujarat 2002.<br /><br />Beyond such open violence, it is the routinisation of communalism in daily life that is new. Mobilisation on communal lines took new forms after the Vishwa Hindu Parishad/Bharatiya Janata Party decided to raise the issue of the Babri Masjid. The rath yatra of 1990, the Congress’s cynical attempt at soft Hindutva, and the destruction of the Babri Masjid completed the post-Independence transformation of India on communal lines. All this has contributed in no small measure to the growth of domestic terrorism. India is tragically now a less tolerant society than what it was in the early 1980s. <br /></i><br /><br />http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/how-is-india-doing-2012/article4249630.eceRiaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-24806547243052551152012-07-20T07:36:17.121-07:002012-07-20T07:36:17.121-07:00Here's a Rediff report on violence against wom...Here's a <a href="http://www.rediff.com/news/column/violence-against-women-blame-our-prejudices-not-the-victim/20120720.htm" rel="nofollow">Rediff</a> report on violence against women in India:<br /><br /><i>The latest available statistics compiled by the home ministry's National Crime Records Bureau show that between 1953 and 2011, the incidence of rape rose by 873 per cent, or three times faster than all cognisable crimes put together, and three-and-a-half times faster than murder.<br /><br />In India, a woman is raped every 22 minutes, and a bride burnt for dowry every 58 minutes. The police last year registered 42,968 cases of molestation of women -- a figure that's about 80 percent higher than the number of rapes. The number of crimes recorded against women, including sexual harassment, cruelty by the husband or his relatives, kidnapping or abduction, and human trafficking, exceeds 2,61,000.<br /><br />Separate numbers are not available for that South Asia barbarian speciality called acid attacks, which disfigure a woman for life as a punishment for rejecting a man's love or, more usually, lust. Nor does the NCRB go into the harassment faced by women for not bearing a son.<br /><br />The gangster-style grievous assault on the young woman outside a bar in Guwahati is a particularly obnoxious instance of sexual violence. The allegation that a journalist instigated youths to strip her so a TV channel could scoop the story and play it to a voyeuristic audience is now all but established. This further aggravates matters. At any rate, many of those present continued to shoot the incident on their phone cameras for many minutes, ignoring a public-spirited citizen's pleas.<br /><br />The police's failure to respond in time to distress calls from the bar owner is a shameful but familiar part of the story, as is their trivialisation of the incident and lethargy in arresting all the molesters. Even more deplorable is the manner in which the victim's identity was disclosed by the media, by a member of the National Commission for Women, and worse, the Chief Minister's Office -- against all elementary ethical norms.<br />Even worse, a Unicef report this year on adolescents finds that not just 57 per cent of Indian males but also 53 per cent of females in the 15-19 age-group believe that wife beating is justified. (Even in Bangladesh, only 41 percent of females justify wife beating.) Such acceptance and sanctification of domestic violence does not speak of a civilised society.<br /><br />Girls under ten being have been raped while on their way to use a public toilet, say women living in Delhi’s slums. In one slum, boys hid in toilet cubicles at night waiting to rape those who entered. These are some of the incidents mentioned in a recent briefing note [1] based on research supported by WaterAid and the DFID-funded SHARE (Sanitation and Hygiene Applied Research for Equity).<br />The link between a lack of access to water and sanitation facilities and sexual violence against women is not well known and to date has received insufficient attention. The briefing note highlights this link within the context of urban slums in Delhi, and suggests how this problem can be addressed.</i><br /><br />http://www.rediff.com/news/column/violence-against-women-blame-our-prejudices-not-the-victim/20120720.htmRiaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-48851581477071062352012-02-02T09:06:41.365-08:002012-02-02T09:06:41.365-08:00India is the deadliest country for girl child, acc...India is the deadliest country for girl child, according to a report published by the <a href="http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-02-01/india/31012468_1_child-mortality-infant-mortality-infant-deaths" rel="nofollow">Times of India</a>:<br /><br /><i>NEW DELHI: It's official - India is the most dangerous place in the world to be a baby girl. Newly released data shows that an Indian girl child aged 1-5 years is 75% more likely to die than an Indian boy, making this the worst gender differential in child mortality for any country in the world.<br /><br />Newly released United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs ( UN-DESA) data for 150 countries over 40 years shows that India and China are the only two countries in the world where female infant mortality is higher than male infant mortality in the 2000s. In China, there are 76 male infant deaths for every 100 female infant deaths compared with 122 male infant deaths for every 100 female infant deaths in the developing world as a whole.<br /><br />The released data has found that India has a better infant mortality sex ratio than China, with 97 male infant deaths for every 100 female, but this is still not in tune with the global trend, or with its neighbours Sri Lanka (125) or Pakistan (120).<br /><br />When it comes to the child mortality sex ratio, however, India is far and away the world's worst. In the 2000s, there were 56 male child deaths for every 100 female, compared with 111 in the developing world. This ratio has got progressively worse since the 1970s in India, even as Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Egypt and Iraq improved.<br /><br />The UN report is clear that high girl child mortality is explained by socio-cultural values. So strong is the biological advantage for girls in early childhood that higher mortality among girls should be seen as "a powerful warning that differential treatment or access to resources is putting girls at a disadvantage", the report says.<br /><br />"Higher female mortality from age 1 onwards clearly indicated sustained discrimination," says P Arokiasamy, professor of development studies at Mumbai's International Institute for Population Studies, who has studied gender differentials in child mortality in India. "Such neglect and discrimination can be in three areas: food and nutrition, healthcare and emotional wellbeing. Of these, neglect of the healthcare of the girl child is the most direct determinant of mortality," says Arokisamy. Studies have shown that health-related neglect may involve waiting longer before taking a sick girl to a doctor than a sick boy, and is also reflected in lower rates of immunization for girls than boys.<br /><br />Moreover, since the outrage over India's poor child sex ratio came out of census data for children aged 0-6 years, the UN data on child mortality indicates that a campaign against female foeticide alone is not a complete solution. "Pre-natal and post-natal discrimination are complementarily contributing to gender imbalance," agrees Dr Arokiasamy. While pre-natal discrimination in the form of sex-selective abortions is more common among better educated upper income households, post-natal discrimination or neglect is more common among poorer, less educated rural households, he adds.</i><br /><br />http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-02-01/india/31012468_1_child-mortality-infant-mortality-infant-deathsRiaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-61438447654902399302012-01-02T22:40:14.570-08:002012-01-02T22:40:14.570-08:00Here's Times of India on human sacrifice of a ...Here's <a href="http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Farmers-sacrifice-7-yr-old-girl-for-good-crop-held/articleshow/11346202.cms" rel="nofollow">Times of India</a> on human sacrifice of a 7-year-old girl in India:<br /><br /><i>Two farmers from Bijapur district have been arrested for allegedly killing a seven-year old girl to offer her body part as a sacrifice to God for good crops, police said on Monday.<br /><br />Two farmers, Padam Sukku and Pignesh Kujur, have been arrested for killing the girl, Lalita, in anticipation of good crops, Additional SP of Bijapur district BPS Rajbhanu said. Lalita had gone missing on the night of October 21 last year, following which, her father Budhram Tati had registered a missing person's complaint with the police. Her body was found on October 27.<br /><br />During the investigation, police came to know that Lalita had been murdered and last week, police registered a case of murder and arrested the duo in this connection. When quizzed, Sukku and Kujur admitted they had kidnapped and strangled her. They said they had removed the liver and offered it to the God at a temple. They buried her body which was retrieved by animals. </i><br /><br />http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Farmers-sacrifice-7-yr-old-girl-for-good-crop-held/articleshow/11346202.cmsRiaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-33949397130274272462011-10-27T09:07:27.122-07:002011-10-27T09:07:27.122-07:00http://news.yahoo.com/wife-sharing-haunts-indian-v...http://news.yahoo.com/wife-sharing-haunts-indian-villages-girls-decline-083401584.html<br />"Wife-sharing" haunts Indian villages as girls decline<br /><br />BAGHPAT, India (TrustLaw) - When Munni arrived in this fertile, sugarcane-growing region of north India as a young bride years ago, little did she imagine she would be forced into having sex and bearing children with her husband's two brothers who had failed to find wives.<br /><br />"My husband and his parents said I had to share myself with his brothers," said the woman in her mid-40s, dressed in a yellow sari, sitting in a village community center in Baghpat district in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh.<br /><br />"They took me whenever they wanted -- day or night. When I resisted, they beat me with anything at hand," said Munni, who had managed to leave her home after three months only on the pretext of visiting a doctor.<br /><br />"Sometimes they threw me out and made me sleep outside or they poured kerosene over me and burned me."<br /><br />Such cases are rarely reported to police because women in these communities are seldom allowed outside the home unaccompanied, and the crimes carry deep stigma for the victims. So there may be many more women like Munni in the mud-hut villages of the area.<br /><br />Munni, who has three sons from her husband and his brothers, has not filed a police complaint either.Mayrajnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-48389277380794677422011-07-31T10:10:08.691-07:002011-07-31T10:10:08.691-07:00Here's a BBC report on women protest against s...Here's a <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-14357443" rel="nofollow">BBC report</a> on women protest against sexual harassment in India:<br /><br /><i>A rally has taken place in India's capital inspired by the "Slutwalk" protests held in a number of countries.<br /><br />The protest is to challenge the notion that the way a woman looks can excuse sexual abuse or taunting - "Eve teasing" as it is known in India.<br /><br />Hundreds took part in Delhi, though there was little of the skimpy dressing that has marked protests elsewhere.<br /><br />The protests originated in Canada after a policeman said women could avoid rape by not dressing like "sluts".<br />'It's our lives'<br /><br />The BBC's Mark Dummett in Delhi says the organisers are trying to challenge the mindset that the victims of sexual violence are to blame for the crimes committed against them.<br /><br />He says Delhi can be a very difficult city for women, with sexual harassment commonplace, and rapes and abduction all too frequent.<br /><br />And according to a recent survey, India remains one of the most dangerous countries in the world for women.<br /><br />One protester told our correspondent: "Every girl has the right to wear whatever she wants, to do whatever she wants to do with her body. It's our lives, our decisions, unless it's harming you, you have no right to say anything."<br /><br />Another protester said: "There are a lot of problems for women in Delhi because a lot of women do face sexual harassment and just a couple of weeks ago the chief of police of Delhi said that if a women was out after 0200 she was responsible for what happens to her, and I don't think that's the right attitude."<br /><br />Most of the marchers in Delhi were soberly dressed in jeans and T-shirts or traditional shalwar kameez.<br /><br />India recorded almost 22,000 rape cases in 2008, 18% up on 2004, the National Crime Records Bureau says.</i><br /><br />http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-14357443Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-6527780094363867742011-07-23T18:51:15.116-07:002011-07-23T18:51:15.116-07:00Here's an interesting perspective assigning re...Here's an <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/14213136" rel="nofollow">interesting perspective</a> assigning responsibility to the West for female feticide:<br /><br /><i>Hvistendahl points a finger at the West for encouraging the epidemic of sex selection which has gripped Asia since the early 1970s.<br /><br />Amniocentesis tests and ultrasound scans have led to more than 160 million girls being aborted in Asia alone since then, according to one widely quoted 2005 estimate.<br /><br />It had to do, Hvistendahl writes, with the West's paranoid population control movement during the Cold War - a growing fear that more hungry babies would grow up and turn to communism. The "monster of sex determination in Asia" lead to vastly skewed ratios in countries like India, China and South Korea.<br /><br />Western money, she writes, was used to set up an extensive network of family planning advisers and doctors that encouraged women to opt for amniocentesis.<br /><br />That's not all. Throughout the late 1960s and early 70s, writes Hvistendahl, influential US experts supported sex selection in academic papers and government-sponsored seminars - "a disturbed sort of technological sexism".<br /><br />In 1969, sex determination was included as one of the 12 new strategies for global birth control at a US workshop. Henry Kissinger, then secretary of state under Richard Nixon, signed a classified memo stating that "abortion is vital to the solution" of population growth in the world.<br /><br />So in India, Hvistendahl says, advisers from the World Bank and other organisations pressured the government to "adapt a paradigm" where population was the problem. The Rockefeller Foundation and the Ford Foundation poured money into "research into reproductive biology".<br /><br />And in the mid-1960s, she writes, leading American embryologist and biochemist, Sheldon Segal, showed doctors at India's top medical school AIIMS, how to test human cells for sex chromatins that indicate whether a person is female - a method, she says, that was the precursor to foetal sex determination.<br /><br />In India, the early sex selective abortions were performed openly at government hospitals. Doctors helped identify the sex and abort the foetus if it was a girl. Hvistendahl quotes from papers written by senior doctors belonging to India's premier medical school, the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), in which they back prenatal sex determination as a way of putting an end to "unnecessary fecundity". In other words, female foetuses were aborted in the name of population control.<br /><br />It was only in the late 1970s, when India's feminist groups and other campaigners began making a noise about sex selection, that the authorities took notice.<br /><br />By that time, writes Hvistendahl, the damage had been done. At AIIMS alone, doctors had aborted an estimated 100,000 female foetuses. Taxpayers' money and Western funding had been spent to fund sex selective abortions. Today, 112 boys are born for every 100 girls in India, against the natural sex ratio at birth of 105 boys for every 100 girls. This is what Dr Sabu George, a leading expert on sex selection, calls the "forgotten story" of India's missing girls.</i><br /><br />http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/14213136Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-55255393958462138552011-06-25T20:06:18.560-07:002011-06-25T20:06:18.560-07:00Girls being surgically changed into boys, reports ...Girls being surgically changed into boys, reports <a href="http://www.hindustantimes.com/News-Feed/madhyapradesh/Indore-doctors-turn-scores-of-baby-girls-into-boys/Article1-713863.aspx" rel="nofollow">Hindustan Times</a><br /><br /><i>Girls are being 'converted' into boys in Indore - by the hundreds every year - at ages where they cannot give their consent for this life-changing operation.<br />This shocking, unprecedented trend, catering to the fetish for a son, is unfolding at conservative Indore's well-known clinics and hospitals on children who are 1-5 years old. The process being used to 'produce' a male child from a female is known as genitoplasty. Each surgery costs Rs 1.5 lakh.<br /><br />Moreover, these children are pumped with hormonal treatment as part of the sex change procedure that may be irreversible.<br /><br />The low cost of surgery and the relatively easy and unobtrusive way of getting it done in this city attracts parents from Delhi and Mumbai to get their child surgically 'corrected'. http://www.hindustantimes.com/Images/HTEditImages/Images/26_06_pg1a.jpg<br /><br />About 7-8% cases come from the metros, say doctors.<br /><br />While genitoplasty is relatively common - it is used to correct genital abnormality in fully-grown patients - the procedure is allegedly being misused rampantly to promise parents a male child even though they have a female child.<br /><br />The parents press for these surgeries despite being told by doctors that the 'converted' male would be infertile.<br /><br />While genitoplasty experts of Indore say each of them have turned 200 to 300 girls into 'boys' so far, only one could cite an instance when a 14-year-old was converted into a girl. ...</i>Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-74236028837570862092011-06-24T20:32:51.179-07:002011-06-24T20:32:51.179-07:00Americans, too, prefer boys over girls, according ...Americans, too, prefer boys over girls, according to a new <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2007948/How-twice-Americans-prefer-son-daughter.html#ixzz1QFrvWhd9" rel="nofollow">Gallup poll</a>:<br /><br /><i>A new survey has found that almost half of people would prefer to have a baby boy than a baby girl.<br /><br />48 per cent of respondents admitted they wanted a son more than they wanted a daughter.<br /><br />By contrast, just 28 per cent said they would rather have a girl, while 26 per cent said they would be content with either sex. The remaining people polled either had no opinion or didn't know what they wanted.<br /><br />Gallup, which interviewed over 1,000 people across the U.S. for its research, revealed that Americans' preference for a male child today is even stronger that it was in 1941, when just 38 per cent wanted a boy more.<br /><br />It said that the same poll 70 years ago found that just 38 per cent of people wanted a son more than a daughter,with 24 per cent stating preference for a baby girl.<br /><br />The organisation found that the age, sex and education levels of respondents all made a difference in what the response was likely to be.<br /><br />Fifty-four percent of people under 30 said that they would prefer a male child, but those with a university education showed equal results for both sexes.<br /><br />Its report read: 'It is significant that 18- to 29-year-old Americans are the most likely of any age group to express a preference for a boy because most babies are born to younger adults.<br /><br />'The impact of the differences between men and women in preferences for the sex of their babies is also potentially important. The data from the U.S. suggest that if it were up to mothers to decide the gender of their children, there would be no tilt toward boys.'<br /><br />Even political stance made a difference. Republicans were more likely than Democrats to state preference for a male child.<br /><br />Gallup said that the trend was 'driven partly by the fact that American men are more likely to be Republicans and women are more likely to identify as Democrats.'</i><br /><br />Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2007948/How-twice-Americans-prefer-son-daughter.html#ixzz1QFrvWhd9Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-12835785921777271972011-06-20T08:22:59.424-07:002011-06-20T08:22:59.424-07:00Indian woman gang raped and set alight in Uttar Pr...Indian woman gang raped and set alight in Uttar Pradeash, according to the < href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-13835838BBC:<br /><br /><i>A woman has been gang raped and burnt alive in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, police say, the latest in a series of brutal but unrelated attacks on women there.<br /><br />The woman's family says five men gang-raped her and then set her alight in her own home in Etah district.<br /><br />In the past week there have been three violent attacks on women in the state.<br /><br />Correspondents say Uttar Pradesh is one of India's most lawless states where women are accorded a very low status.<br /><br />On Friday a 14-year-old girl was stabbed in the eye as she fought off two men who attempted to rape her.<br /><br />The teenager was attacked in Gadwa Buzurg village in the Kannauj district of the northern state. She lost one eye and the other was also seriously damaged.<br /><br />Police say the attackers were from her own village. Only one has been arrested so far and police said they were looking for the second man.<br /><br />Two policemen in the area, who initially refused to lodge the parents' complaint, have been suspended.<br /><br />Last week, a girl's body was found hanging from a tree on police premises in the Nighasan area of Lakhimpur district.<br /><br />The girl's parents alleged that she was raped and murdered and that the police had offered them a bribe to keep quiet.<br /><br />In the latest incident the woman, who was in her thirties, was sitting outside her home when five men dragged her inside the house and gang-raped her, according to her family.<br /><br />Her family say the attackers sprinkled kerosene on her and set her on fire because the woman had recognised them and they were afraid of being caught.<br /><br />The woman managed to give a statement to police but died shortly afterwards.<br /><br />Police say they are are still looking for the attackers.<br /><br />Earlier this year, the head of the National Commission for Women, Girija Vyas, said Uttar Pradesh was at the top of the list when it came to violent crimes against women.<br /><br />State authorities have been criticised in recent years after several attacks on women and girls were reported.</i><br /><br />http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-13835838Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-64478766858225472592011-03-31T22:19:02.315-07:002011-03-31T22:19:02.315-07:00Interesting. The highest number of births are taki...Interesting. The highest number of births are taking place in the<br />lowest quintile of the population primarily because infant mortality<br />is very high. In other words we are adding more to the poor.<br />Interestingly, the overall sex ratio has increased from 933 to 940 per<br />thousand malesinspite of the fact that lesser girls are being born. I<br />had studied this earlier. This is on account of the large number of<br />adult males dying early on account of substance abuse (1.2 million),<br />road accidents (over 100,000), insurgencies, cardio-vascular disease<br />etc. PavanPavannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-41047364648127808242011-03-31T18:21:14.249-07:002011-03-31T18:21:14.249-07:00Here's Soutik Biswas of the BBC on India Censu...Here's <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/soutikbiswas/2011/03/indias_census_the_good_and_bad_news.html" rel="nofollow">Soutik Biswas of the BBC</a> on India Census 2011:<br /><br /><i>The good news is that at 17.64%, the rate of growth between 2001-2011 represents the sharpest decline over a decade since Independence. The growth rate was at its lowest between 1941-1951 when it was 13.3%: that was a time of famine, religious killings, and the transfer of populations in the run-up to partition. The growth rate was more than 24% between 1961 and 1981. So a 17.64% growth rate points to a slowing down that will cheer those who are concerned about how India will bear the burden of its massive population.<br /><br />The bad news for those with such concerns is that India still has more than a billion people, and this number is rising. Indian politicians and policy planners speak eloquently about how this population will fetch demographic dividends, and ensure India's growth story.<br /><br />But such optimism can be unfounded if the state is found wanting in the way that it is. It is very easy, warn social scientists, for this demographic dividend to turn into a deficit with millions of uneducated, unskilled and unemployed young people on the streets, angry and a threat to peace and social stability. "There is nothing to brag about our population growing and crossing China. Do we know how we are going to skill all these people?" That is the question of India's top demographer, Ashish Bose.<br /><br />The government would like to say that the dip in population growth has to do with pushing a successful contraception programme in the country. But social scientists say that with rising urbanisation, it is no surprise that population growth is on the decline. Increasing urbanisation leads to nuclear families in small homes paying high rents in increasingly expensive cities. Having more children does not help matters.<br /><br />The biggest shock in this census is the decline in the child gender ratio at 914 girls (up to six years) for every 1000 boys. This is the lowest since Independence and it looks like a precipitous drop from a high of 976 girls in the 1961 census.<br /><br />Social scientists and demographers believe that the decline in the number of girls all over the country - in 27 states and union territories - points to deeply entrenched social attitudes towards women, despite economic liberalisation and increasing work opportunities.<br /><br />They link sex determination tests and female foeticide - banned in India, but still quite widespread due to lax enforcement - to the rising costs of dowry, a practice which even the burgeoning middle classes have been unable to get rid of. "Marriages have become costlier, dowries have been pricier, so there is a lot of social resistance to having girl children in the family," says Mr Bose. </i>Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-72366693928958904612011-03-31T12:00:41.645-07:002011-03-31T12:00:41.645-07:00Here are some excerpts from a BBC report on India ...Here are some excerpts from a <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-12916888" rel="nofollow">BBC report</a> on India Census 2011:<br /><br /><i>India's population has grown by 181 million people over the past decade to 1.21bn, according to the 2011 census.<br /><br />More people now live in India than in the United States, Indonesia, Brazil, Pakistan and Bangladesh combined.<br /><br />India is on course to overtake China as the world's most populous nation by 2030, but its growth rate is falling, figures show. China has 1.3bn people.<br /><br />The census also reveals a continuing preference for boys - India's sex ratio is at its worst since independence.<br /><br />Female foeticide remains common in India, although sex-selective abortion based on ultrasound scans is illegal. Sons are still seen by many as wage-earners for the future.<br /><br />Statistics show fewer girls than boys are being born or surviving. The gender imbalance has widened every decade since independence in 1947.<br /><br />According to the 2011 census, 914 girls were born for every 1,000 boys under the age of six, compared with 927 for every 1,000 boys in the 2001 census.<br /><br />"This is a matter of grave concern," Census Commissioner C Chandramauli told a press conference in the capital, Delhi.<br /><br />Government officials said they would review all their policies towards this issue, which they admitted were failing. <br /><br />Indians now make up 17% of the world's population. Uttar Pradesh remains its most populous state, with 199 million people. <br /><br />The statistics show India's massive population growing at a significant rate - 181 million is roughly equivalent to the entire population of Brazil.<br /><br />But the rate of that growth is slower than at any time since 1947. The 2011 census charts a population increase of 17.6%, compared with one of 21.5% over the previous decade.<br /><br />The BBC's Mark Dummett in Delhi says the slowing growth rate suggests that efforts to promote birth control and female education are working.<br /><br />In the field of education there was good news, with the census showing the literacy rate going up to 74% from about 65% in the last count.<br /><br />India launched the 2011 census last year. The exercise costs in the region of 22bn rupees ($490m; £300m).<br /><br />Some 2.7 million officials visited households in about 7,000 towns and 600,000 villages, classifying the population according to gender, religion, education and occupation.<br /><br />The exercise, conducted every 10 years, faces big challenges, not least India's vast area and diversity of cultures.<br /><br />Census officials also have to contend with high levels of illiteracy and millions of homeless people - as well as insurgencies by Maoists and other rebels which have left large parts of the country unsafe.</i>Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-31349321492028773842011-03-26T22:16:54.019-07:002011-03-26T22:16:54.019-07:00Here's an article from Peacework magazine abou...Here's an article from <a href="http://www.peaceworkmagazine.org/pacifist-critique-gandhi" rel="nofollow">Peacework magazine</a> about Mohandas K. Gandhi's misogyny and racism:<br /><br /><i> To make a hero out of someone dehumanizes them almost as much as demonizing them does. It serves no one to turn Mohandas Gandhi into a plaster saint (or a stone Ganesh).<br /><br />Many of Gandhi’s statements and actions were reprehensible, some of which are mentioned elsewhere in this issue (such as the treatment of his children [5], see page 10). There isn’t space for a full critique, but a few themes are important to mention. One of Gandhi’s contributions to nonviolent thought is the idea that a true dedication to nonviolence requires striving for the complicated truth. As we appreciate Mohandas Gandhi’s many contributions to the development of nonviolent struggle, we can’t, if we are to appraise his legacy honestly, ignore his faults as well.<br /><br />Gandhi campaigned vigorously to include women in every non-cooperation campaign, and organized against purdah. Yet, Gandhi, in his old age, regularly slept naked next to young girls, including his nieces, in order, he said, to test his commitment to brahmacharya, or celibacy. No matter how some try to contextualize these actions, from my perspective, he was abusing these girls.<br />Editor's Note: The following additional paragraph was edited from the printed version for reasons of space:<br /><br />---------<br />His views about rape were misogynist. Gandhi wrote in Harijan, for example, that women “must develop courage enough to die rather than yield to the brute in man.” Gandhi claimed, if women are fearless, “However beastly the man, he will bow in shame before the flame of her dazzling purity.”<br /><br />Gandhi opposed contraception (he had a famous debate with Margaret Sanger [6] on the subject). His “idealization” of women as being superior at self-sacrifice, a quality he saw as being required of satyagrahis, is another form of stereotyping (See also Starhawk's trenchant feminist critique of Gandhian self-sacrifice [7] in this issue).<br /><br />Gandhi often utilized racist arguments to advance the cause of Indians in South Africa. For example, addressing a public meeting in Bombay on September 26, 1896, following his return from South Africa, Gandhi said, “Ours is one continued struggle against degradation sought to be inflicted upon us by the European, who desire to degrade us to the level of the raw kaffir [8], whose occupation is hunting and whose sole ambition is to collect a certain number of cattle to buy a wife with, and then pass his life in indolence and nakedness.” (Collected Works, Volume II, page 74). The word kaffir (or keffir) is a derogatory term used in South Africa for native Africans. Gandhi never, as far as I’ve read, publicly opposed the racist oppression of black Africans in South Africa.<br /><br />Pacifism?<br /><br />Gandhi was, at best, an inconsistent pacifist, in the sense of opposing all wars, a fact pointed out by pacifists such as Bart de Ligt in the 1930s. Gandhi supported the British war effort in several wars, including the Boer War, the Zulu Rebellion (though he later came to believe the British were wrong in that struggle), and World War I. His role was mainly to organize and participate in ambulance corps, but his personal participation earned him the British Empire’s War Medal. Even after he proclaimed “war is wrong, is an unmitigated evil,” he defended his participation based on his perceived “duty as a citizen of the British Empire.” He acknowledged that he was “guilty of the crime of war,” and eventually repudiated the Empire, but didn’t repudiate his actions. (See Gandhi on War and Peace, by Rashmi-Sudha Puri).<br /><br />While Gandhi undeniably campaigned vigorously against untouchability, Dalit leaders such as Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar opposed the use of Gandhi’s term for “untouchables” (“harijan,” or “children of god”) as condescending, and claimed Gandhi never fully renounced a caste-based worldview.</i>Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-90397994408213480992011-01-26T10:55:32.622-08:002011-01-26T10:55:32.622-08:00A horror tale of a 17-year-old girl living in slav...A horror tale of a 17-year-old girl living in slavery and abused for nearly five years by a businessman's family for a mere Rs 7,000 has surfaced in the city on the eve of the Republic Day, according to <a href="http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/nagpur/For-Rs-7000-girl-kept-as-slave-abused-for-5-years/articleshow/7363958.cms#ixzz1CAVnhUdM" rel="nofollow">Times of India</a>.<br /><br />The girl was rescued last Thursday by volunteers of Childline, an NGO, and is now undergoing rehabilitation in the state government's Karuna women's shelter home on Katol Road. <br /><br />The matter is under investigation by the Koradi police who are, however, yet to register an offence. <br /><br />According to activists of Childline, the girl (name withheld) was virtually pawned with the family of businessman Rajesh Janiani, a resident of Mankapur, some five years ago when she was just 12-years-old. Her mother Sita (name changed on request), a resident of Lashkaribagh, desperately needed money for the treatment of her elder daughter Sunita, then 14, who was later diagnosed with brain tumour. Sita works as domestic help in some houses. Her husband, a habitual alcoholic, does no work. <br /><br />Sita approached the Janianis through a neighbour Sheela who used to work as domestic help with them. Janianis apparently extended a loan of Rs 7000 to Sita. They asked her to let her children work with them for some time in order to repay the loan. Sita says she agreed since it was summer vacation and sent her daughter and son to work with Janianis who run a grocery store in Sadar. <br /><br />Initially, the girl was first sent to Agra for six months to look after a handicapped relative of the Janianis. After the person's death, she was brought to the city. <br /><br />Sita says since then she was not allowed to meet her daughter. Janianis allegedly kept the girl at their home while her brother was employed at their shop. Both suffered frequent beatings at the slightest pretext. The girl has revealed to her rescuers that she was given just four rotis with pickles every two days to eat and a cup of tea with one biscuit in the morning. <br /><br />Childline volunteers said neighbours had confirmed hearing the girl being beaten up by the Janianis and crying. The couple's two grown up sons, both in their 20s, too used to beat her up. Whenever the family went out, the girl would be locked up in the store room with a stock of rotis and water to last her for the period of the outing. On Wednesday, the Janianis were all set to go to Goa for a vacation after locking her up thus. <br /><br />After suffering abuse for about two years, her brother ran away to Bilaspur. A missing complaint was lodged about this but he returned on his own about a week later and resumed working with the Janianis. Since then, Sita says he did not suffer beatings and was working in Janiani's shop only during the day. They were not allowed to meet the girl though. <br /><br />According to Sita, whenever she went to see her daughter, she was sent away on some excuse or only shown the girl from a distance. She was all the time assured the girl was fine. <br /><br />Sita says the kids were not paid anything for their work. She continued with the arrangement even after the loan amount was settled because she thought the girl was being taken care of and was even getting some education. When for prolonged period, Sita could not see her daughter she became apprehensive. <br /><br />She says she even went to the Koradi police who did not entertain her complaint. Sita approached the crime branch a few days ago but the cops here too made perfunctory enquiries with Janianis who told them they did not have any girl in the house. Finally she was helped by Aruna Gajbhiye, principal of Tirpude College of Social Work, who suggested that she approach Childline, a central government initiative to help children in distress run with the help of NGOs.Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5848640164815342479.post-50392940055843298512011-01-21T21:56:16.867-08:002011-01-21T21:56:16.867-08:00Here's a Guardian story of women's abuse i...Here's a <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/jan/21/devadasi-india-sex-work-religion" rel="nofollow">Guardian</a> story of women's abuse in the name of Hindu religion in India:<br /><br /><i>Parvatamma is a devadasi, or servant of god, as shown by the red-and-white beaded necklace around her neck. Dedicated to the goddess Yellamma when she was 10 at the temple in Saundatti, southern India, she cannot marry a mortal. When she reached puberty, the devadasi tradition dictated that her virginity was sold to the highest bidder and when she had a daughter at 14 she was sent to work in the red light district in Mumbai.<br /><br />Parvatamma regularly sent money home, but saw her child only a few times in the following decade. Now 26 and diagnosed with Aids, she has returned to her village, Mudhol in southern India, weak and unable to work. "We are a cursed community. Men use us and throw us away," she says. Applying talcum powder to her daughter's face and tying ribbons to her hair, she says: "I am going to die soon and then who will look after her?" The daughter of a devadasi, Parvatamma plans to dedicate her own daughter to Yellamma, a practice that is now outlawed in India.<br /><br />Each January, nearly half a million people visit the small town of Saundatti for a jatre or festival, to be blessed by Yellamma, the Hindu goddess of fertility. The streets leading to the temple are lined with shops selling sacred paraphernalia – glass bangles, garlands, coconuts and heaped red and yellow kunkuma, a dye that devotees smear on their foreheads. The older women are called jogathis and are said to be intermediaries between the goddess and the people. They all start their working lives as devadasis and most of them would have been initiated at this temple.<br /><br />Girls from poor families of the "untouchable", or lower, caste are "married" to Yellamma as young as four. No longer allowed to marry a mortal, they are expected to bestow their entire lives to the service of the goddess.<br /><br />The devadasi system has been part of southern Indian life for many centuries. A veneer of religion covers the supply of concubines to wealthy men. Trained in classical music and dance, the devadasis lived in comfortable houses provided by a patron, usually a prominent man in the village. Their situation changed as the tradition was made illegal across India in 1988, and the temple itself has publicly distanced itself from their plight.<br />---------<br />Chennawa, now 65 and blind, is forced to live on morsels of food given by devotees. "I was first forced to sleep with a man when I was 12," she says. "I was happy that I was with Yellamma. I supported my mother, sisters and brother. But look at my fate now." She touches her begging bowl to check if people have thrown her anything. "My mother, a devadasi herself, dedicated me to Yellamma and left me on the streets to be kicked, beaten and raped. I don't want this goddess any more, just let me die."<br /></i>Riaz Haqhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00522781692886598586noreply@blogger.com