US designs and India
THE US dislike for India knows no bounds despite periodic assurances to ease the ill-conceived economic sanctions.

Punch not punchline
IDEALLY debates in legislatures should carry punch. An opposition MLA in Tamil Nadu took this seriously and landed a big punch on a Minister’s nose, causing a nasty cut.

Private Urdu channel
UNION Human Resource Development Minister Murli Manohar Joshi’s promised commitment to the promotion and propagation of Urdu should be taken with a liberal pinch of salt.

HEART & MIND OF PAKISTAN
by G. S. Bhargava
THE Prime Minister’s bold initiative in undertaking the bus trip to Pakistan — nicknamed bus diplomacy by the media — has raised hopes of improved relations between our two countries, if not resolution of some bilateral disputes. There is ambivalence in both India and Pakistan in assessing the event.

Consumer movement needs expansion
by Arvind Bhandari
IN the ultimate analysis, we are all consumers. Therefore, a major yardstick for assessing the maturity of a society is the extent to which it protects the interests of its consumers.

Violence stuns Pakistan’s arts world
From Cassandra Balchin
LAHORE: Devastated by the loss of artist Zahoor-ul-Akhlaq and his dancer daughter Jahanara, who were shot dead in their Lahore home, Pakistan’s arts world has decided to take a stand against the senseless violence that has become an everyday feature of life in the country. Zahoor, 58, was a giant in Pakistan’s arts world and the founder of the country’s modern art movement. But he was the very gentlest of giants and one of the few figures to be loved and respected by all shades of opinion in the often divided artistic circles.

Romance of sparrows
by O. P. Bhagat
AN early spring morning. Half a dozen sparrows are hopping about on the lawn. Conspicuous among them is a black-bib male. He has set his eyes on one of the females. He shakes his wings and struts before his sweetheart. But the lady has her thoughts elsewhere. She pecks at the seeds or other bits of food lying around there.

75 Years Ago

Untouchability struggle
in Kerala
INDIA is to witness in a few days a glorious fight, one to establish the dignity of man and his right of free movement in public place. The scene is to become an important Hindu centre in Travancore, i.e. the southern part of Kerala

US designs and India

THE US dislike for India knows no bounds despite periodic assurances to ease the ill-conceived economic sanctions. Perhaps, a militarily stronger and confident India does not fit in the American scheme of things for South Asia. How else should one look at the US pressure on Russia to abandon its plan for “strategic partnership” with India? Washington has taken the IMF route to kill the Indo-Russian initiative in the direction of elaborating the principles enshrined in the treaties signed between New Delhi and Moscow in 1971, 1993 and 1994. During last December’s visit of Russian Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov to New Delhi it was agreed that a declaration for setting new parameters for strategic partnership between the two countries would be signed when President Yeltsin would be in India sometime in 1999. The USA has quietly sounded the IMF to impress upon the Russian authorities that the promised bailout loan will be released only if the move for “sensitive defence deals” with India is dropped. In what manner Moscow has reacted officially to this armtwisting is not known, but a prominent communist leader of Russia, Mr Gennady Zhuganov, has publicly expressed his anger at the covert US pressure to prevent the two traditionally friendly nations from strengthening their relationship covering a variety of subjects. India hopes that the Russian leadership will treat the US-dictated IMF conditionalities with the contempt they deserve, as the direction in which India and Russia are moving will benefit both. The new partnership programme will help Russia to overcome its economic hardships in an honourable way. It may also transmit a significant signal to Western capitals, especially Washington, that Russia is not solely dependent on their “charity” to come out of the morass in which it finds itself today. Russian economic ills have their roots in the West from where it imported a system (of free market economy) to be implanted in a land not ready to accept it so quickly. Thus, it is the moral duty of the West and its institutions to help Russia in its economic reconstruction without any strings attached.

As Russian Defence Minister Marshal Sergeyev stated in New Delhi on March 19, the strategic ties between the two countries were relevant for regional and international security also. Russia and India have been struggling for a “balanced multi-polar system of relations” so that no single power can pose a threat to world peace. This is how the agreement to transfer advanced Russian weapons to India till 2010 acquires special significance. India’s efforts to take possession of the 40,000-tonne aircraft carrier “Admiral Gorshov” are likely to bear fruit as Russia is keen on parting with this “gift”. The scheme will serve Moscow’s desire to reshape the world to ensure an even spread of military power. That the deal will bring financial dividends to Moscow — as India may have to buy highly advanced fighter planes like MiG-29K and S-300 anti-missile defence systems — goes without saying. This is not in accordance with the anti-India US designs. Hence its use of the institutions like the IMF to scuttle the move.

Punch not punchline

IDEALLY debates in legislatures should carry punch. An opposition MLA in Tamil Nadu took this seriously and landed a big punch on a Minister’s nose, causing a nasty cut. This is pretty ugly but what followed was uglier still. It led to a free-for-all and the Speaker sent the offending MLA to jail. He was clearly overstepping his power. He seems to have drawn an analogy with the presiding officer of a court of law who can award imprisonment on the charge of contempt of court after a summary trial. The Speaker realised the lapse the next day and persuaded an all-party meeting to move a resolution committing the MLA to a fortnight in prison. It was an unanimous vote and even the members of the AIADMK, the party the jailed MLA belongs to, voted with others. Their objective is simple. This is about the lightest punishment he could get for the hard blow. The Assembly could well have expelled him for the rest of the term, of about two years. Or a criminal case could have been launched, which could have resulted in rigorous imprisonment of at least a few months. Why not then settle for two weeks of simple imprisonment and also allow the furore to die down? But that is without reckoning with the shrill lady. Ms Jayalalitha is going about accusing the Speaker of partisan behaviour and the police of harassing another party MLA by denying him proper medical help. Of course, it is the continuation of her old charge that the DMK has hatched a big conspiracy against her and her party. Her over-reaction is natural. Only last month her former auditor told the police that she and two of her associates thrashed him, causing bloody gashes. As a news agency has reported, Tamil politicians are giving up the punchline in favour of real punch.

The case of the attack inside the Assembly is much more complicated than all this. The Madras High Court has ordered the release of the MLA on the basis of the first day’s order by the Speaker. The Speaker has refused to take notice of the court decision on the very justifiable ground that in the Indian scheme of things the legislature and the judiciary are supreme in their own spheres of activities and hence he is not bound by the High Court order. But that does not make the task of the police any easier. As experts suggested, the MLA was released and rearrested outside the prison on the basis of the Assembly resolution and then wait for the court’s response. This is the second time in recent years that the state witnesses a jurisdictional dispute between the Assembly and the High Court. The first one ended inconclusively, in a draw. It is safe to assume that this time too the result will not be any different.

Private Urdu channel

UNION Human Resource Development Minister Murli Manohar Joshi’s promised commitment to the promotion and propagation of Urdu should be taken with a liberal pinch of salt. He was invited to inaugurate a computerised calligraphy and Urdu application centre at the Ghalib Academy in Delhi. He had no option but to make polite noises in favour of promoting the language which is gasping for breath in what is known as the Hindi belt. Successive governments have done great disservice to the sister language of Hindi by treating it as a political issue for garnering Muslim votes. Had it been primarily a language of North Indian Muslims alone it would not be fighting for survival in a predominantly Punjabi-speaking Pakistan. The issue of the status of Urdu in the Indian context has now been put in the correct perspective by Syed Taruj, the Hyderabad-based Managing Director of Falak Television and Broadcasting Limited. He very deftly removed the confusion of the real position of the language in India while announcing the launching of an exclusive private Urdu channel from April 12. He said the channel should meet the infotainment requirements of the 20 per cent Urdu-speaking population of India, apart from reaching out to pockets of Urdu lovers in 135 countries. However, the most important point he made while sharing the information with the media was that the proposed channel was meant to “propagate Urdu and not Islam”.

The clarification was necessary in the context of the motivated and misleading propaganda of the anti-Urdu lobby in North India. Brij Narain Chakbast, Raghupati Sahai “Firaq”, Krishan Chander, Rajinder Singh and Mohinder Singh Bedi, Jagannath Azad and Gopichand Narang are among a galaxy of non-Muslim writers who have contributed to the growth of Urdu literature. Mr Taruj said that the channel would focus on “promoting the language, social and ethical values, moral obligations and decent wholesome entertainment”. He did well to emphasise that the soaps, sitcoms and talk shows would strive to reflect the “Ganga-Jamuni” Hindustani culture of the country. In response to a question whether the Urdu channel would source programmes from PTV, Mr Taruj left no scope for doubt by stating that “we want no connection with Pakistan”. According to him the “promos” brought in a flood of emotional reviews from large parts of the country including Lucknow, Srinagar, Ahmedabad and parts of Guwahati and Maharashtra”. His silence on the response from Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh was both strange and disturbing. Punjab still has an Urdu language newspaper while in Rajasthan, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh Hindi has virtually driven Urdu out of circulation. When the Urdu channel goes on air on April 12 the response from what was once an important centre of Urdu literature comprising Punjab, Haryana and Himachal should be a shade more encouraging than from other parts of the country.

HEART & MIND OF PAKISTAN
Kashmir: varying perceptions
by G. S. Bhargava

THE Prime Minister’s bold initiative in undertaking the bus trip to Pakistan — nicknamed bus diplomacy by the media — has raised hopes of improved relations between our two countries, if not resolution of some bilateral disputes. There is ambivalence in both India and Pakistan in assessing the event. While some dismiss it as euphoria which will dissipate on the bedrock of realism when intractable problems like Kashmir are on the agenda, others are hopeful of a step-by-step approach to all the disputes without formally saying so. That Pakistan under Mr Nawaz Sharif has not made the normalisation of relations with India hostage to a “satisfactory settlement of the Kashmir dispute” is seen as promising.

Secondly, there has always been dichotomy between the friendship of the people of Pakistan for their Indian neighbours and their antipathy for India — not merely the government. Over 30 years ago during the Ayub Khan period, I was intrigued by the phenomenon. Posted as a correspondent at Rawalpindi, then the capital of the country, I received unalloyed kindness from Pakistanis wherever I went — Pindi, Lahore and Karachi (Dacca was out of bounds for most Indian journalists). They included fellow journalists, most politicians and quite a few officials. At the same time, most of them regarded India with hostility, for one reason or the other. Even if some of the vocal India-baiting was for the record, a kind of play acting, as an insurance for keeping company with an Indian, the anti-Indian sentiment was very much there.

True, I could not and did not study the ethnic variations in Pakistani perception of and attitude towards India, except to note that the Bengalis were generally friendly — some like H.S. Suhrawardy and the future Bangabandhu, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, from what was then East Pakistan and Wali Khan, worthy son of the Frontier Gandhi, and his indomitable Begum from the North-West Frontier Province obtrusively, and others less formally. More recently, Pakistani participants at the meetings of the Pakistan-India People’s Forum for Peace and Democracy have showed that their stand on Kashmir and achieving amity with India varies, with the Sindhis and the Baloch not keen on claiming Kashmir for Pakistan, and the Punjabis and the Pashtoons swearing by acquiring the territory of Jammu and Kashmir while oozing sympathy for the Kashmiris. Similarly, Indians from the South and the East are less Kashmir-centric in their approach to the India-Pakistan dispute while those from the North lay stress on Kashmir.

Dr Mehtab Ali Shah, Professor of International Relations at the University of Sindh and a Sindhi by birth, has systematically studied and documented the ethnic variations in the security and foreign policy perceptions of the people of Pakistan’s provinces — Punjab, the North-West Frontier Province, Balochistan and Sindh — plus the saraikis or the inhabitants of the area where the borders of the four provinces converge, to show that Pakistan is far from being a homogeneous entity despite the over-arching Islamisation of its polity and society, and its long spell of military dictatorships. Bangladesh having become a separate sovereign entity was beyond his study. This is not far different from the situation in this respect from India and its multi-facetedness, sometimes bordering on chaos.

Dr Shah’s seminal study (“The Foreign Policy of Pakistan: Ethnic Impact on Diplomacy”, I.B. Tauris & Co, London) was obviously published (in 1997) long before this bus diplomacy was even conceived. It is an academic study uninfluenced by personal preferences. According to it, secession from Pakistan of what was then East Pakistan in 1971 sharpened the ethnic differences among the Pakistanis, which had lain dormant in the earlier 25 years. Two points that he makes in this context are significant. One, if East Pakistan had been contiguous with the rest of the country and not separated by a large Indian land mass, its secession would have had more direct and immediate impact on the other provinces, with the Sindhis and the Balochis opting to go the Bengali way. Secondly, according to Dr Shah, even if Pakistan’s intentions (and ill-conceived attempts) to foment secession in India’s Punjab, Jammu and Kashmir and the North-East succeed the heartland of India will not disintegrate.

This brings into focus the very important fact that religion, despite its emotive power, is not a durable cement to keep different ethnic communities of Pakistan together. Shared religion was the raison d’etre of Pakistan perceived by its founder as a homeland of the Muslims of undivided India. The formation of Bangladesh was its first open repudiation. If ethnic factors determine the security and foreign policy agendas of the rest of the Pakistani communities, the two-nation theory is in tatters. Of course, Dr Mehtab Ali Shah’s book does not directly deal with the two-nation theory.

The insights which Dr Shah’s study provides into the mind and heart of Pakistan should come in handy in formulating India’s policy towards Pakistan. First, the Punjabis and the Pashtoons who together dominate the Pakistan army and the establishment “insist” that Pakistan should support the secessionist forces in Jammu and Kashmir and Punjab to avenge the separation of Bangladesh and as a riposte for India’s alleged support to Sindhi and Baloch nationalists. They were also for Pakistan going nuclear “to counter-balance” India’s conventional superiority. “They feel that Pakistan needs to keep the bomb for its own security vis-a-vis India, irrespective of the Kashmir dispute. There is no support from these circles for either a free trade area or “for a confederation of India and its South Asian neighbours.”

“Many Sindhi and Baloch spokespersons ... hold an almost opposite opinion on India because of their common cultural-ethnic affinities, historical legacies and geographical compulsions”. Their solution for the Kashmir dispute is what is called the fourth option. It is to unite the “two parts of the Kashmir valley”, leaving the northern areas of Gilgit and Baltistan in Pakistan and Jammu and Ladakh in India. The “united valley” is to be “a single demilitarised and neutralised state of Kashmir.”

Surprisingly, there is no acknowledgement of “Kashmiriat” or shared culture of Hindu and Muslim Kashmiris, nor is there any mention of the fate of the Pandits uprooted from their homes in the valley. But, as Dr Shah stresses, the Sindhis and the Baloch are opposed to the Khalistan idea because, interestingly, it will be the nucleus of a greater Punjabi state with Lahore as its capital. That will aggravate “Punjabisation” of Pakistan and further marginalise the Sindhis and the Baloch.

Finally, how did the Pashtoons who were staunch opponents of partition under the leadership of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, get to team up with the Punjabis. “The co-option of Pashtoons into the state sector” of Pakistan and the virtual division of Afghanistan between Pashtoons and the rest have “destroyed an otherwise strong Pashtoonistan movement”. In terms of personalities, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, although a Sindhi, catered to the dominant Punjabi constituency while the action of Mr Nawaz Sharif, a Punjabi, in curtailing the arbitrary powers of the President by scrapping the notorious eighth amendment to the 1973 constitution and declaring as null and void the Council for Defence and National Security (CDNS) — “dominated by Punjabis” — favour the ethnic minorities.

Consumer movement needs expansion
by Arvind Bhandari

IN the ultimate analysis, we are all consumers. Therefore, a major yardstick for assessing the maturity of a society is the extent to which it protects the interests of its consumers. The consumer movement in India has made some headway, but a lot more needs to be done by way of consolidation and further expansion.

The enactment of the Consumer Protection Act in 1986 was a landmark in the growth of the consumer movement in the country. In view of the delays and frustration caused by the tardy procedures of normal courts, the Act stipulated the establishment of quasi-judicial consumer fora throughout the country which would redress the grievances of consumers regarding the goods and services purchased by them.

Consumer fora were set up at the district level to entertain claims for compensation of less than Rs 5 lakh, state commissions were set up at state headquarters to consider claims between Rs 5 lakh and Rs 20 lakh, and a National Commission for the Redressal of Consumer Grievances was constituted in the Capital to adjudicate on claims exceeding Rs 20 lakh. Provision was made for an appeal to the next forum in the hierarchy. All decisions were supposed to be handed down within 90 days.

However, the objective of speedy justice has been lost in the congestion and crowding that have resulted. A decision within 90 days is more an exception than the rule, with the result that a large cases are pending.

Of the 12,28,363 cases filed so far before the district fora throughout the country, 9,46,868 have been settled, which means only 77 per cent. In Delhi, 6,38,854 cases were filed before the six district fora up to January, 1999. Of these, 46,031 cases have been disposed of and 17,823 are pending. The situation at the level of state commissions is equally distressing. Of the 3,709 cases instituted before the Delhi State Commission, only 2,302 have been settled, which means that 1,408 cases are pending.

The plight of the National Commission is perhaps the worst. Of the total number of 14,500 cases filed before it, 6,000 are pending. On visiting the National Commission a few days ago, I was told that these days the commission is hearing cases of 1994! The commission’s office was clogged by mountains of files.

Inadequacy of the network of the consumer fora is only partly responsible for this unsatisfactory state of affairs. An equally important reason is the callous attitude of the state governments. At the inception stage itself the state governments were reluctant to implement the law and moved forward grudgingly only after Common Cause, a consumer organisation, petitioned the Supreme Court. Often, district fora and state commissions are rendered non-functional because of delays in the appointment of their members.

Each district forum and state commission has a president and a judicial member and a non-judicial member, one of whom should be a woman. An order is valid only when signed by the president and at least one member. Information gathered by the Union Ministry of Consumer Affairs a few months ago revealed that of the 543 district fora in the country, 64 were non-functional because vacancies had not been filled. In UP, 32 of the 83 district fora were non-functional. Of the 32 state commissions, five were non-functional. Several others, although functional, had at least one vacancy.

Further, several consumer fora suffer from lack of staff and other support infrastructure. Judges of the six district fora in Delhi recently wrote to the Chief Secretary in this connection. A meeting of the state commissions held in 1994 had recommended that the fora handling over 500 complaints should get a staff of 11. But most are functioning with half that strength, though the number of cases is often 10 times more.

Doctors have from time to time raised a hue and cry that they should be exempted from the purview of the Consumer Protection Act. The Supreme Court settled this matter once and for all in November, 1995, when, in a case brought by the Indian Medical Association against a order of the National Commission, it removed all doubts about the applicability of the Consumer Protection Act in the case of doctors. A study conducted jointly by Dr Jagdish Singh of Sawai Mansingh Medical College, Jaipur, and Mr Vishwa Bhushan, an advocate, shows that consumer fora have been quite “considerate” towards doctors. In only 52 cases out of 183 were negligence charges upheld.

Food and Consumer Affairs Minister S.S. Barnala has indicated that the Consumer Protection Act would be amended to make consumer fora more effective. There is urgent need for one more chamber at the apex level of the National Commission. More district fora and state commissions are also needed. For example, in the case of Delhi there is already a proposal to add three district fora to the existing six. The amount of Rs 60 crore the Centre provides to the states to strengthen the infrastructure of consumer fora should be doubled.

Romance of sparrows
by O. P. Bhagat

AN early spring morning. Half a dozen sparrows are hopping about on the lawn. Conspicuous among them is a black-bib male. He has set his eyes on one of the females.

He shakes his wings and struts before his sweetheart. But the lady has her thoughts elsewhere. She pecks at the seeds or other bits of food lying around there.

The chap persists. He shakes his wings and flicks his tail. He is determined to draw her attention.

Still she shows no interest in him. Her manner seems to suggest: “No such nonsense at feeding time.” But black bib does not care. He comes strutting as before.

His love begets anger. Like a girl rebuffing a roadside Romeo, the female chases him a little away.

Does that put an end to the male’s ardour? No. The guy is boldly back at his game. He may win her favour this time.

Courting sparrows are a common sight these days. You see them on a lawn, near a hedge, in a courtyard, on a parapet — almost anywhere. For where men live, sparrows also live. The bird is rightly called house-sparrow.

The male has already chosen a site. As soon as he has won a mate, the two start putting up their nest. Both bring the building material — straws, tiny twigs, fibres, feathers and pieces of string. Of the two the male is more hard-working.

They prefer to nest in a house. Actually, any building. It may be a poor man’s cottage or a rich man’s mansion. Or it may be a place of work or worship. Even a busier place. Only it should be safe from other birds and animals.

Sparrows have an inborn faith in man. This is why they are not shy of people. Rather, they go quite close to them. Freely or informally they flit in or out of the rooms. At times this is very annoying. But many put up with them.

A niche, a shelf, a large enough hole in a wall — any place will do to build their nests on or in. Some opt for the bowl-like canopy fixed to hide the ceiling fan’s hook. Or a basket tucked away in a corner. A forgotten hat will also do.

The male guards the nesting site jealously. He will fight any other male that comes near it. Often the battle is loud and long and quite dramatic.

There is darting in the air and grappling on the ground. The two overturn or roll over, and yet do not give up. Peace returns only when one of the two flees or falls dead.

Does the widow mourn her mate’s death? Rarely if ever. Her first concern is to call in a new mate.

The nest is a nursery rather than a dwelling. Only the mother sparrow sleeps in it while the eggs or chicks are there. The male sleeps in a community roost on a tree nearby.

The chicks have voracious appetites. They have to be fed with beaks full of grubs and other morsels all day long. The parents take care of them until their wings are “a little stronger”. Once they are able to fly, they go away.

Though built with the utmost care, the nests are not always safe. Animals, and some humans too, raid them. Then there are pests. They suck the helpless chicks’ blood. The sparrows’ death rate is pretty high.

To make up for the loss, the sparrows breed twice or thrice a year.

Violence stuns Pakistan’s arts world
From Cassandra Balchin

LAHORE: Devastated by the loss of artist Zahoor-ul-Akhlaq and his dancer daughter Jahanara, who were shot dead in their Lahore home, Pakistan’s arts world has decided to take a stand against the senseless violence that has become an everyday feature of life in the country.

Zahoor, 58, was a giant in Pakistan’s arts world and the founder of the country’s modern art movement. But he was the very gentlest of giants and one of the few figures to be loved and respected by all shades of opinion in the often divided artistic circles. Jahanara, 24, was probably the most talented of the younger generation of classical dancers. With her potential, she may someday have overtaken even her ustaad (maestro), the famous Kathak dancer Nahid Siddiqui.

The loss of Jahanara forced Siddiqui to ask in an emotional obituary, “Where can people like us go? Should precious artistes become victims of the chaos this society has created? Or should they never come here, so that at least ... their lives are not taken away in such a brutal manner?”

Highlighting the need for action, Siddiqui asked, “I wonder whether we realise that every one of us is in danger. A gun shot these days is considered no more shocking than a slap used to be in the past”.

While the city’s arts world was shattered, the press and the police speculated as to the cause of the incident, in which Jahanara’s fiancé Al Noor and artiste Anwar Saeed were also injured.

But friends noted that what caused the killer’s anger is irrelevant. The point is that he could get hold of a gun, calmly walk into their house and make murderous violence the solution.

When artistes, students, intellectuals and activists gathered at Lahore’s National College of Arts for a memorial for Zahoor on February 4, the day of his 59th birthday, they unanimously expressed their anger about the state of society. “Democracy in Pakistan”, said writer Suroosh Irfani, “has come to mean the democratisation of terror”.

Human rights lawyer Asma Jahangir, referring to the fact that the killer was apparently given refuge by a parliamentarian before surrendering to the police, noted angrily, “Killers can find refuge, but ordinary people can’t find refuge in their own homes”.

“It is not for us only to grieve”, she stated, “but for all of us to be fearful”. Jahangir, who was defending a love marriage case in the Lahore High Court that week, added bitterly, “It seems that it is easier to get away with murder these days than to marry of your own choice”.

Pledging to carry out his plans for a college mural, colleagues remembered the gentle Zahoor as “the only Pakistani painter of genius”, with a “minor talent for slipping out of any argument”.

The younger generation of arts students was also deeply affected. One addressed the memorial gathering saying, “We always thought this would never happen to us — should we turn away? We should stamp our feet against this violence before it destroys everything. We must stand up and say no to this madness”.

Following the memorial, a silent procession against violence was taken out on Lahore’s main thoroughfare, The Mall. Carrying black flags and huge photographs of Zahoor and Jahanara, the 400 processionists marched up to the high court. Along the way, some asked the processionists what was it all about, but many simply turned their heads and carried on. Great grief, it seems, has become a usual affair in Pakistan.

The procession was led by Nahid Siddiqui and Scheherezade, Zahoor’s life partner and herself an internationally famous sculptor. Scheherezade is determined that the loss of half of her family will make people stop and think. Astoundingly dignified, she hugged everyone who came to the memorial, saying, “What times we live in! We must learn from this and gain strength from it all”.

A day after the February 20 “chelum” (the gathering to mark the end of the traditional mourning period), a memorial was held for Jahanara. Candles and earthenware lamps, photographs of this beautiful young woman, rose petals and marigolds adorned the auditorium. The theme was the immortality of the spirit and the need to halt the violence.

Noorjehan, her younger sister, was the first to speak. Confident that Jahanara lives on “somewhere in another space-time continuum”, Noorjehan said that even though she could no longer see her sister physically, “I can still feel you emotionally — and you’re making fun of me”. Paraphrasing her favourite film director, Noorjehan pointed out the significance of a dancer’s life: “It is not the image that is important, but the emotion that it evokes”.

Friends and family spoke of Jahanara’s love of life, her concern for her friends, her delight in the use of foul language, her love of the colour red, her loud laughter, her deep bonds with her mother and father. Appealing to all those present to take heart and not be immobilised by grief, one friend remembered with a smile, “I associate Jahanara with many things, but I don’t associate her with tears”.

Siddiqui also refused to be cowed down by grief: “I know she is still dancing”, she said, adding that she envied the metaphysical freedom Jahanara has attained. Being liberated from the physical constraints of the body, “let her dance freely!” she said.

Jahanara’s uncle reminded those present of the need to relish the company of those they love “for they may not be here tomorrow”. Fortunately, at least home videos of her performances had been made, right from her first tentative experimentation to her last tour de force, revealing a dancer of grace and abounding energy.

But dancing was just one of her talents. Some in the audience remembered her in the street theatre group Ajoka’s play “Jalli Kithe Jave”, the story of the loneliness of migrant workers’ wives and of the mistreatment of mentally disturbed women by faith healers, spiritual charlatans and doctors. Instead of playing the victim, Jahanara had brought the character a strength and power that condemned these social evils.

Zahoor and Jahanara will be formally remembered. The National College of Arts, Pakistan’s premier arts school, has renamed a lecture theatre and a gallery in his honour. And in January every year there is to be a dance festival in Jahanara’s honour — a move which will be one in the eye of the orthodox.

But the most fitting way of remembering them is the stand that artistes have taken against violence. As young director Zain Ahmed said at Jahanara’s memorial, “I have lost a friend and a colleague. How many more will it take before we do something? I don’t want to lose the rest of my friends like this”.

Over the coming months, one can be certain that violence will be the focus of the work of many Pakistani artistes. — WFS

75 YEARS AGO

Untouchability struggle in Kerala

INDIA is to witness in a few days a glorious fight, one to establish the dignity of man and his right of free movement in public place. The scene is to become an important Hindu centre in Travancore, i.e. the southern part of Kerala

It may be news to the outsiders to hear that there are public roads in Kerala which all men cannot freely use. It is a common sight to see poor men and women flying at the sight of so-called “caste men” for the former’s unapproachability and possible pollution of the latter.

This curse of unapproachability, which is even more inhuman than untouchability is peculiar to Kerala.

The Congress Committee has, therefore, placed this item in the forefront of this year’s programme. A strong committee, with full powers, has been appointed for carrying out the same. Till now, the Congress Committee was engaged in general propaganda only.

The new committee’s programme includes special celebrations, processions through public roads, etc.