Thursday Open Mike (now on Tuesdays)

Freedom for Kashmir?

2008-08-26T13:23:00.003-05:00

Murali:

As you may know, the state of Jammu and Kashmir in India has been on the boil since a botched-up plan to transfer 100 acres of land to the Amarnath Shrine Board. It has been fascinating to follow, the expression of a people seeking self-determination in massive numbers (some reports put it at over half a million protesters). And the reactions of mainstream politicians and media in India. For once, the media seems to be slightly more open to different viewpoints (as articles by Arundhati Roy and Prem Shankar Jha have appeared in mainstream publications) -- of course, all that is accompanied by the usual denunciations of anyone differing from the official line as being unpatriotic or a traitor or even enemy.

Arundhati Roy has been spending time in Srinagar lately, and she writes this moving piece on the struggles in the Kashmir Valley. Partly historical and mostly earnest, she writes about how the current scenario came to pass and how different people in Srinagar think and feel. There are two main points discussed: (a) freedom for Kashmir, and (b) the Islamic color of the protests. Both are interesting questions in their own independent right, and probably very important too in how they are handled.

Here is the article, and a couple of excerpts:
Land and Freedom

For the past 60 days or so, since about the end of June, the people of Kashmir have been free. Free in the most profound sense. They have shrugged off the terror of living their lives in the gun-sights of half a million heavily armed soldiers, in the most densely militarised zone in the world.

After 18 years of administering a military occupation, the Indian government's worst nightmare has come true. Having declared that the militant movement has been crushed, it is now faced with a non-violent mass protest, but not the kind it knows how to manage. This one is nourished by people's memory of years of repression in which tens of thousands have been killed, thousands have been "disappeared", hundreds of thousands tortured, injured, and humiliated. That kind of rage, once it finds utterance, cannot easily be tamed, rebottled and sent back to where it came from.

The Indian military occupation of Kashmir makes monsters of us all. It allows Hindu chauvinists to target and victimise Muslims in India by holding them hostage to the freedom struggle being waged by Muslims in Kashmir.

India needs azadi from Kashmir just as much as - if not more than - Kashmir needs azadi from India.

Outlook India also has some good coverage and analysis of the issue.

Worth some discussion in our open mikes...

----

Sanjeev:

I had encountered a couple of interesting phrases - 'soft issue' vs
'hard issue' when it comes to debates in a country.

'Hard issues' were ones that question the territorial integrity of a
country and are difficult to debate because the conclusion is already
hard coded into the adult population of a country.

I didn't think much of this phrase when I heard of it six months back.
But, I am beginning to appreciate that there may be some truth in it.
I think this a priori conclusion for me is, 'Kashmir issue is an
internal problem of India'. It is possible that this is because I have
a strong defense upbringing. But, is this untrue for everyone on this
group?

If this is true for everyone on this group, it is difficult to have a
honest discussion about freedom in Kashmir. The only honest discussion
we can hope to have is if there are ways in which we can minimize the
suffering of the communities in Kashmir.

I received a query, which helps clarify my statement a bit. I have
taken permission to quote the query and reply to it here.

> How hardcoded is this? Do you personally believe that the communities in
> Kashmir should have a say on what should happen to them or do you think they
> are governed by a centralized authority - i.e. India.

It is hard coded and it is also subtle.

Yes, I believe communities in Kashmir should have a say on what should
happen to them and here is the catch, I believe this just as much as I
believe people in Narmada should have a right to decide whether they
should be displaced to have a dam or not.

In reality these two are not the same. Narmada does not question
territorial integrity of the country - it merely demands the rights of
it's citizens. Equating the two indicates my assumption that Kashmiris
want to be citizens of this country. Which is what I mean by
conclusion before the debate.

----

Meenakshi:

Over 30 years of conflict could have led the current generation of Kashmiris to believe they want to be a break away state. Perhaps I am veering off topic here, but if we liken this to what is currently happening in South Ossetia & Abkhazia one wonders if this is what Kashmir is in for even if it breaks away to become independant.

North Ossetia has been a part of Russia for a longtime. The South & Abkhazia which is a mix of Russians & Georgians, was claimed by seperatists with Russian backing. On came Georgia and tried to annex the region with US support and the ensuing war which has devastated the territory.

Russia now claims to acknowledge the South Ossetian seperatists.

Even though the preferences of the local population is not terribly clear, the parallels are quite striking...

----

Santhosh:

Hi Sanjeev,

Your points made me ponder on this for a while.

Why would I support those displaced by the Narmada?
Why would I support the tribals in Orissa displaced and rendered helpless(by taking over their forests) by mining projects?

Is it mainly because their rights as citizens were transgressed? Coming to think of it, that's probably the right approach or one of the better ways to fight the system/state. But, I feel there is more to this. Are 'Rights' only defined by a state for its citizens?

Let's say some tribals were technically living in the border states and living as hunter/gatherers moving across national boundaries. If the state were to restrict access to the forests as their citizenship is not defined or if they are forced to migrate to a different geographical location, because the forests are taken over for an industrial project - are their 'rights' being respected? What has been their way of living for centuries is now questioned in such a way that their existence is threatened. If I, a citizen of one of the countries were to support the position of the tribals to access their habitat(s), is it under the assumption that they are citizens of the country? Do I need to accept the concept of a nation state to understand the position of the tribals?

Another situation - Illegal immigrants living in slums being evacuated forcibly. So, in a very basic way from a human rights perspective, the demands of those subjugated by centralized authority need to be respected. If its clear that for a group of people the concept of a nation state no longer means anything and the inhabitants of the region decide not to be associated with the nation state (truthfully and adequately represented i.e.), then they probably have the right to do so (irrespective of what we believe would happen to them later).

At this point, I don't seem to have much of a problem questioning the concept of a nation state itself.

One Genius or Many Hard-working intelligent people?

2008-08-18T21:24:00.001-05:00

Rahul:

An interesting video, and a possible topic for discussion.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/video/conference/2007/gladwell

He kind of puts forth an interesting question: Does the world in 2020 need geniuses who can solve a problem in a moment of brilliance or many hard-working stubborn intelligent people who are willing to collaborate to get to the solution of a difficult problem?

A few things that crossed my mind as i saw this:

* Is the kind of problems the world is facing (and expected to face) indeed something that can be better tackled by many hands as opposed to one brilliant mind? or is it a manifestation of the kind of problem-solvers that our educational / professional system creates?

* Considering that necessity is the mother of invention, is the collaborative infrastructure and the surplus of readily available information that we have at our disposal (which probably wasnt there a few years ago) killing the creativity in us? There is a school of thought: "'Best Known Practices are actually Innovation Killers'.

* While this is not mentioned in the talk, is innovation / creativity today perceived in a similar manner as it was a few years ago?

Something that i would love to hear the thoughts of everyone on.

Open Mike 24: Assessing pornography in a feminist framework

2008-08-05T13:23:00.000-05:00

Vinod:

Very interesting topic. Here is more from Bob Jensen -- a story he is very fond of repeating at his talks:

This is a story of a female student at the University of Texas. She was riding from Austin to Dallas for a football game on a bus chartered by a fraternity, on which many of the passengers were women. During the trip, someone put into the bus' VCR a sexually explicit video. Uncomfortable with those hardcore sexual images of women being used by men, the female student began a discussion with the people around her about it, and one of the men on the bus agreed that it was inappropriate. He stood up and said to the other men, "You all know me and know I like porno as much as the next guy, but it's not right for us to play this tape when there are women on the bus."

No doubt it took some courage for that young man to confront his fraternity brothers on the issue, and we should honor that. But we should recognize that his statement also communicated to his fraternity brothers that he was one of them -- "one of the guys" -- who, being guys, naturally like pornography. His objection was not to pornography and men's routine purchase and use of women's bodies for sexual pleasure but to the viewing of it with women present. He was making it clear that his ultimate loyalty was to men and their right to use women sexually, though that use should conform to some type of code of chivalry about being polite about it in mixed company.

In doing that, he was announcing his own position in regard to sex. He was saying: I'm just a john! A man who buys another human being for sex.

Pornography is really rampant among men (these days to a much smaller extent, among women). Virtually every man I know has been or is currently a user of pornography (for masturbation, or otherwise). It is important for one to engage in a critical self-analysis and be accountable for one's behavior. The question to ask oneself should be, do you want to participate in a system in which women are sold for sexual pleasure, be it part of prostitution, pornography, strip bars, or any other way. To again quote something Bob Jensen said, "A man should feel guilty about this. Guilt is the proper response to an unjust act. When we do things that are unjust, we should feel guilty." Pornography creates a class of people (women) that can be bought and sold, in which case, the people in that group will always be treated as lesser, or available for abuse.

To quote Bob Jensen one last time

The way out of this is the Marxian "ruthless criticism of the existing order". The most important point is, if a man thinks all this doesn't affect him because he is one of the "good men," I wouldn't be so sure. I'm told that I am one of those good men. I consider myself an active feminist. I have been part of groups that critique men's violence and the sex industry. And I struggle with these issues all the time. I was raised and trained by society to be a man in this culture, and I cant wash away that training overnight. None of us is off the hook.

Murali:

A nuanced look at pornography (negative, positive, correlation with rape and sexual violence) by Michael Shermer in his book, The Science of Good and Evil: (see pages 195-202). Paraphrasing some points from the book:

Also references studies that show a strong correlation between pornography and sexual violence for people with limited exposure to sex or with negative attitudes towards sex, even mild erotica. Denmark lifted all bans on pornography in the 1960s when pornography surged, and subsequently sex crimes fell drastically. The idea behind the statistic being that whatever the cause for rape, it is not pornography in this case. This is not to say that negative pornography does not have an effect on increasing violence in some cases, but here also, people with limited social and sexual experience are more likely to be influenced by pornography. Interestingly, similar reactions were had from non-pornographic material that showed aggression to women.

Open Mike 24: Assessing pornography in a feminist framework

2008-08-05T13:19:00.000-05:00

Folks, we will be having our regular Tuesday open mike session today.

Thursday Open Mike 24 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Assessing pornography in a feminist framework
August 5, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive, #244
Austin TX 78746

Sorry about the late notice, been a little busy. Some links below.

Thanks,

-Murali

----

I havent had much time to collect good information or read up much on it, but anyways, here are some links:

Robert Jensen, UT journalism professor, has come out with a new book, Getting Off: Pornography and the End of Masculinity. The book expresses some strong opinions:

Pornography is big business, a thriving multi-billion dollar industry so powerful it drives the direction of much media technology. It also makes for complicated politics. Anti-pornography arguments are frequently dismissed as patently "anti-sex"—and ultimately "anti-feminist"—silencing at the gate a critical discussion of pornography's relationship to violence against women and even what it means to be a "real man."In his most personal and difficult book to date, Robert Jensen launches a powerful critique of mainstream pornography that promises to reignite one of the fiercest debates in contemporary feminism. At once alarming and thought-provoking, Getting Off asks tough but crucial questions about pornography, manhood, and paths toward genuine social justice.

Pornography is a civil rights issue, by Andrea Dworkin
http://www.nostatusquo.com/ACLU/dworkin/WarZoneChaptIVF1.html
http://www.nostatusquo.com/ACLU/dworkin/WarZoneChaptIVE.html

A great many men, no small number of them leftist lawyers, are apparently afraid that feminists are going to take their dirty pictures away from them. Anticipating the distress of forced withdrawal, they argue that feminists really must shut up about pornography--what it is, what it means, what to do about it--to protect what they call "freedom of speech." Our "strident" and "overwrought" antagonism to pictures that show women sexually violated and humiliated, bound, gagged, sliced up, tortured in a multiplicity of ways, "offends" the First Amendment. The enforced silence of women through the centuries has not.

A different take on the issue, reviewing Jensen and his book:

A mixed review
http://briarpatchmagazine.com/2008/02/28/getting-off/

Getting Off is likely not a book that will achieve the widespread cultural awakening Jensen seeks, simply because both his arguments and tactics will alienate most readers. In his attempt to shock readers out of their complacency by forcing them to face the misogyny reflected in the worst aspects of pornography, Jensen leaves little room for the off-screen realities of complicated, contradictory, conflicted sexuality.

The tyranny of Anti-porn Feminism
http://www.priceofliberty.com/freesex.htm

Feminists for Free Expression
http://www.ffeusa.org/html/statements/statements_pornography.html

Defining sex-positive feminism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_positive_feminism

Another very personal account tying pornography to sexual violence:

Getting the Monster in My Cupboard: A Personal Account by Rebecca
http://manufacturedcontempt.wordpress.com/2007/06/30/getting-the-monster-in-my-cupboard-a-personal-account-by-rebecca/

Open Mike 23: Nelson Mandela

2008-07-27T13:13:00.000-05:00

Thursday Open Mike 23 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Nelson Mandela
July 29, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive, #244
Austin TX 78746

Links sent out by Rahul on the yahoogroups:

Nelson Mandela turned 90 a couple of weeks ago (and it was celebrated with a concert to raise funds for AIDS). The press has covered the event extensively with an analysis of his life, influence, and shortcomings. It would be interesting to take a look at the same, and here are some links for that.

90th Birthday Celebration

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1036194/Nelson-Mandela-interrupts-90th-birthday-celebrations-make-plea-poor.html

BioGraphy:
http://www.anc.org.za/people/mandela.html

Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nelson_Mandela

Books by Mandela:
http://archives.obs-us.com/obs/english/books/Mandela/Mandela.html

http://books.google.com/books?id=beRL3schM0kC&dq=Nelson+Mandela&pg=PP1&ots=64RF_cb8xP&sig=1bfwtXAIC8VKmPmSqcqYsqXea9c&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=2&ct=result#PPP1,M1

Nelson Mandela Foundation:
http://www.nelsonmandela.org/
The Nelson Mandela Foundation contributes to the making of a just society by promoting the vision, values and work of its Founder and convening dialogue around critical social issues.

Mandela on US Terrorist List
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2008-04-30-watchlist_N.htm
Removed from Terrorist List
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/africa/07/01/mandela.watch/

Assessing 90yrs of the ICon
http://www.australia.to/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=176:nelson-mandela&catid=18:africa&Itemid=27

Also, I read in somewhere the following (but cant seem to find links for it)

As per Mandela, one of the biggest regrets of his tenure as president of SA, is not doing enough for AIDS awareness
As per his wife, one of his regrets is not being involved much in the lives of his children.

Nuclear power debate continues ...

2008-07-26T13:10:00.000-05:00

[From Murali on the yahoogroups]

Nuclear power seems to be much-debated everywhere now. Some Counterpunch and Guardian articles talking about the shaky status of nuclear power in US, UK/France and India:

New nukes not ready for Prime Time (US)

A devastating blow to the much-hyped revival of atomic power has been delivered by an unlikely source---the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The NRC says the "standardized" designs on which theentire premise of returning nuclear power to center stage is based have massive holes in them, and may not be ready for approval for years to come.

'It feels like a sci-fi film' - accidents tarnish nuclear dream (UK/France)

For the past two weeks, Eymard, 41, and her children, 13 and seven, have had a phobia of taps. To wash up, they go out to the yard and fill a bowl from a specially delivered plastic tank of purified water on a fork-lift tractor. They carry the water up to the bathroom to wash. Even the dog drinks bottled water, and it is left out for the birds.
"I feel as if everything's constantly dirty," Eymard said, her hands deep in soapy lather scrubbing plates.
The view from the house over the fields is dominated by the nearby cooling towers of the Tricastin site, a nuclear power plant run by EDF, the company which is poised to buy British Energy and take control of most UK nuclear stations.
Next to the plant is a nuclear treatment centre run by a subsidiary of Areva, the nuclear group which hopes to design many of the new British reactors. Last month an accident at the treatment centre during a draining operation saw liquid containing untreated uranium overflow out of a faulty tank. About 75kg of uranium seeped into the ground and into the Gaffiere and Lauzon rivers which flow into the Rhône. Eymard's house is 100 metres from one of these streams.

Eyes Wide Shut in India

India ratifies nuclear deal (and Parkinson's Law)

"A nuclear reactor is so vastly expensive and complicated that people cannot understand it, so they assume that those working on it understand it. Even those with strong opinions might withhold them for fear of being shown to be insufficiently informed. On the other hand, everyone understands a bicycle shed (or thinks they do), so building one can result in endless discussions: everyone involved wants to add his touch and show that he is there"

--Parkinson's Law of Triviality (from Parkinson's Law, 1955)

FAQ: Indo US Nuclear Deal - less energy, more hype

2008-07-25T13:08:00.000-05:00

[This FAQ is from the Daily South Asian]

Will the nuclear deal provide nuclear fuel and reactors to India?

Contrary to the impression being created, the India US Civilian Cooperation Agreement is only a waiver allowing the US to trade with India on nuclear items. Any import of uranium or reactors will have to be separately negotiated with the US or other countries. The reason that this waiver is required is because after India's Pokhran I test, the US passed a law that barred the US from nuclear commerce with countries which had exploded a nuclear device and were defined as non-nuclear weapons countries in the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

How does the Hyde Act impact India?

The Hyde Act gives India a one time waiver and can be withdrawn by the US in case India does not abide the conditions of the Hyde Act. This includes any further tests and also a number of other issues not related to nuclear matters such as India aligning its polices with the US on foreign policy, working with the US on Iran, joining the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI) that calls for illegal search and seizure operations in high seas. The US President has to report every year to the Congress on India's "good conduct" and if the US President or the US Congress is not happy, can either terminate or suspend nuclear trade with India. The Hyde Act also makes clear that India cannot get an uninterrupted fuel supply arrangement, cannot stockpile fuel and no other country can give better terms than the US in their nuclear trade with India. The Hyde Act also demanded that while India would not get uninterrupted fuel supply guarantees, it must put its civilian reactors under perpetual IAEA safeguards.

Since the Hyde Act is only an US Law, and the actual agreement with the US is the 123 Agreement, how is India is bound by the Hyde Act?

India is not bound by the Hyde Act, but the US is. For us, the 123 Agreement is a agreement with the US for supply of fuel and equipment. The key issue is how to bind the US as a supplier. The US officials are on record that the 123 Agreement ensures that all the Hyde Act conditions are met, the Government's contrary claims notwithstanding. "..we had to make sure that everything in this U.S.-India civil nuclear agreement, the 123 Agreement, was completely consistent with the Hyde Act and well within the bounds of the Hyde Act itself."(Nicholas Burns, Under Secretary for Political Affairs ?Washington, DC ?July 27, 2007).

The US has built into the 123 Agreement that it can pull out whenever it wants: the termination clause makes clear that if either party feels consultation preceding termination will serve no purpose, they can cease further co-operation. In case the US terminates the 123 Agreement, all fuel supplies will stop and all equipment has to be returned to the US. And as per the Hyde Act, the termination clause can come into effect on a broad range of issues including India's continued links with Iran. Therefore, India can be held to ransom over fuel and spare parts for its imported reactors as it was earlier for the two reactors in Tarapur.

Since the issue is our ability to bind the US as a supplier to give guaranteed fuel supplies and spares, no Indian Act passed by Parliament -- as some are arguing -- will help.

Did not 123 Agreement and the IAEA Safeguards Agreement provide for uninterrupted fuel supplies?

The UPA and the PM had assured the country that though the Hyde Act made fuel supply conditional and barred stock piling of fuel except to meet immediate operational requirements, fuel supply assurances would be there in the 123 Agreement and also corrective measures in case of fuel failure would be addressed in the IAEA Agreement. The fuel supply assurances in the 123 Agreement have now been exposed as hollow. The IAEA was held out as the hope for corrective measures, in case fuel supply fails. It is now clear that though the IAEA Draft Safeguards Agreement has perpetual safeguards as per the Hyde Act, the so-called corrective measures are purely cosmetic. There are no corrective measures possible that include pulling Indian reactors out of safeguards once they are offered to IAEA.

Will the Deal not help in lifting sanctions on India for nuclear technology and dual use technology?

The Hyde Act and subsequently the 123 Agreement is clear that sanctions on only uranium fuel and reactors will be lifted. All other technology sanctions -- fuel enrichment, fuel reprocessing, heavy water production and other dual use technologies -- will remain. Dual use technologies are those that are used not only nuclear areas but also other applications such as aerospace, precision manufacturing, electronics, weather prediction, etc. Thus advanced technology for our industries, air crafts, rockets, etc., along with nuclear fuel cycle technology, will continue to be under sanctions. This is in contradiction to what the PM had assured the Indian Parliament.

The Fast breeder Reactors would be regarded as fuel enrichment or fuel reprocessing facilities and would not get access to any technology. Therefore, the mainstay of our future indigenous nuclear energy program will continue under technology sanctions.

Will importing nuclear plants solve our immediate power crisis?

There is a deliberate misinformation being created that nuclear plants will be a quick fix to our huge shortages and power cuts. Nuclear plants have to have detailed studies regarding where and how to put them up and take a long time to build. The import of reactors have to be negotiated commercially and their fuel has to be guaranteed. Typically, the entire process takes 8-10 years. So even if we finish all the steps required to complete the India US Nuclear Deal, it will take not less than 8-10 years before any electricity is produced. And this is an optimistic figure; the last plant that the US commissioned -- the Watts Bar 2 Reactor -- took 23 years to complete. So the belief that nuclear energy will provide an immediate solution to our power crisis is a deliberate fraud on the people.

As against this, the coal-fired plants can be built in 3 1/2- 4 years -- we can build coal-fired plants in about half the time it would take for nuclear plants. Gas fired plants can be put up even faster and with the new strikes of gas in the Kaveri Godaveri Basin, use of gas for producing power quickly is an attractive option.

What is the reason for the power crisis in the country?

This crisis of the power sector is the result of a systematic attempt by successive Governments to starve the sector of public funds hoping to make high-cost private power more acceptable to the people. Instead of investing in the power sector, the Government has gone in for privatisation of the power sector with higher prices of electricity. In the 7th Five Year Plan, we had put in about 21,000 MW; in each of the 8th, 9th and the 10th Plans, we have added less than what we added in the 7th Plan. The net result has been the increasing bankruptcy of State Electricity Boards and converting what was a shortage of the early 90's to a full-blown crisis today.

If we now have enough money for the power sector, we need then to think on the quickest and cheapest way to remove the current electricity shortages while keeping all our options open.

Will the India US Nuclear Deal provide energy security?

The India US Nuclear Deal is not about India's energy security. Energy security lies in using indigenous energy resources such as coal, gas, hydro, etc., and ensuring our future energy supplies from Iran and other countries in West and Central Asia. Obviously, augmenting indigenous coal production, building hydro plants, investing in oil exploration, securing gas supplies through Iran Gas Pipeline are much more important for India's energy security than buying imported reactors and importing uranium for such nuclear plants.

If we do want to build nuclear power plants, we can also build these indigenously. The original three-phase nuclear energy program was based on indigenous fuel and indigenous technology and can give us nuclear energy without making us dependent on imported uranium and imported reactors.

The Government is pushing hard for immediately importing 40,000 MW of Light Water Reactors. Such a scenario would make India completely dependent on imported uranium, which is controlled by a small international cartel. It because of this cartel that the price of uranium has gone up by five times in the last few years. The US, which controls the uranium cartel, would be therefore able to dictate its terms as it will have a stranglehold over these 40,000 MW of nuclear plants.

What are the relative costs of building nuclear plants and coal fired ones?

The nuclear plants -- if we take the cost of imported reactors -- are about three times (Rs. 10-12 crore per MW) the cost of coal-fired plants (Rs. 4 crore per MW). Simply put, with the same amount of money, we can install three coal-fired plants against one nuclear plant of the same size. If we want to install 40,000 MW by 2020 with imported nuclear plants as the Government wants to do, with the same amount of money it can build 100,000 MW of coal fired plants, that too in half the time.

The French company Areva is building a new 1600 MW nuclear plant in Finland. When the estimates were made, Areva had given estimates of $ 2,000 per KW. By the time the plant was ordered, it had gone up about $ 2,800 per KW. Currently, the costs have already shot up to a mammoth $ 6.1 billion or almost $ 4,000 per KW. This is four times the cost of coal-fired plants and also more than twice that of indigenous nuclear plants built by Nuclear Power Corporation. At these costs, even solar energy using solar thermal plants would be competitive!

What are the comparative costs of electricity from nuclear and coal-fired plants?

The cost of electricity from imported nuclear plants is high because of the high capital cost. Even without including de-commissioning costs, storage of spent fuel indefinitely, etc., the cost of electricity from imported nuclear plants will be more than Rs. 5.00 per unit as against about Rs. 2.00 to 2.50 from coal-fired plants. The cost of electricity is therefore at least twice that from coal fired plants.

For those who might remember the Enron case, would know that at that time, India was pushed to accept expensive private power only to help Enron. Once Enron started to produce power, its cost of Rs.5-7 per unit sank the Maharashtra State Electricity Board. If a 2,000 MW Enron plant sank the largest State Electricity Board in the country -- the impact of pushing high cost 40,000 MW of nuclear energy using imported reactors, as the Government wants to do, may well be imagined.

How much can nuclear energy contribute to our energy needs?

Even if we decide to invest heavily in nuclear energy, its contribution to our total energy needs is of limited importance. India has installed capacity of 143,000 MW currently and is slated to raise this to 700,000 to 800,000 MW by 2032. Coal currently meets about 66% of our electricity generation. In this nuclear energy is only 3% of current capacity electricity generating capacity and will at best reach a figure of 8% by 2032. The primary energy source for India will remain coal, which we have in adequate quantities for the next 100 years.

Is there a nuclear renaissance in the world as the Government is claiming?

Nuclear power is not the energy of choice for most advanced countries. Nuclear renaissance is a hype created by the nuclear industry in the US, Western Europe and Japan. In all these countries, the total number of nuclear plants currently being built is only 3. This is against 20 new plants being commissioned every year in the heydays of nuclear energy in these countries.

The US itself has commissioned its last reactor in 1996 and has not licensed a new reactor now for more than 27 years. Its interest in supplying India with reactors is in order to revive its own dying nuclear equipment industry, which has yet to secure a single order in the US despite the promise of billions of dollars in subsidies from the Bush Administration.

It is in order to bail out its dying nuclear industry that the US is so keen that India sign on the Nuclear Deal. Condoleezza Rice, testifying before Senate Foreign Relations Committee (April 5, 2006), pointed out the importance of the Deal for the US, "The initiative may add as many as three to 5,000 new direct jobs in the United States and about 10,000 to 15,000 indirect jobs in the United States, as the United States is able to engage in nuclear commerce and trade with India."

Is there a serious uranium shortage in the country for which we need this Nuclear Deal?

The Department of Atomic Energy has always maintained that we have enough indigenous uranium for 10,000 MW of nuclear power for 30 years. We are not yet close to that number. The present mismatch in uranium availability for operating reactors is a consequence of poor planning, and inadequate prospecting and mining. If we focus on our know uranium deposits and prospect for new ones, there will be enough uranium for a robust indigenous nuclear power programme.

It is because of a smaller availability of indigenous uranium that the 3-phase program started under Homi Bhabha, envisaged Fast Breeder Reactors. Breeder reactors can produce 50 times more energy from the same amount of uranium. This program also planned to use thorium, which we have in abundance. India is a world leader in Fast Breeder technology and is very near to commercialising it. It is not surprising that this is precisely the time that people who have put India under nuclear sanctions for the last 30 years are now talking about making India a member of the nuclear club. A simple objective is to get India to give up its quest for independence in nuclear technology and fuel.

Will nuclear energy address the issue of global warming?

The Inter Governmental Panel on Climate Change, the most authoritative body on climate change has made clear that nuclear energy will have only a marginal impact on global warming. That is simply because its total contribution to the energy needs of the world would be relatively insignificant, even if we consider a very ambitious nuclear energy program. Therefore, the major thrust for reducing greenhouse gases would be greater energy efficiency, public transport, thrust for renewable energy sources and clean coal technologies.

Cynically, the US has been advancing the reduction of India's greenhouse gases as an argument for the India US Nuclear Deal. Nicholas Burns writes, "This agreement will deepen the strategic partnership, create new opportunities for U.S. businesses in India, enhance global energy security, and reduce India's carbon emissions" (Foreign Affairs, Nov/Dec 2007). It is strange that this argument is being advanced when India's per capita emissions are one twentieth that of the US, which has yet to accept a cap on its own greenhouse emissions. The US position is that if the world is endangered by greenhouse emissions, it is countries such as India and China that need to limit their emissions. For the US, no reduction of greenhouse gases is possible; George Bush senior expressed this quite clearly, "American lifestyles are not open to negotiations".

Will investing heavily in nuclear energy reduce our dependence on imported oil and therefore reduce the burden of rising oil price?

Oil and gas, in primary energy terms, are much more important than nuclear as they are already about 45% of our primary energy demand. Oil alone is about 35% of our primary energy demand of which more than 50% is in the transport sector -- cars, buses and trucks and the rest in petrochemicals and fertilizers. Nuclear energy, in contrast is only 1.5% of our primary energy demand. Only a negligible amount of oil -- less than 3% of the total oil consumption -- is used in the power plants. Nuclear energy cannot be used as a substitute for oil except for this 3%; unless the Government experts have found a new way to burn uranium directly in cars and buses!

Though nuclear energy cannot be used in transport, natural gas can -- as we can see in the large number of buses and cars that run on CNG in Delhi. It is indeed strange that the Government, faced with a huge and ever rising oil bill, should focus on the nuclear deal while ignoring the Iran Gas Pipeline project, which will partly insulate India from oil price shocks. It only makes sense if we understand that one of the objectives of the US is to de-link India from Iran through the nuclear deal. "Diversifying India's energy sector will help it to meet its ever increasing needs and more importantly, ease its reliance on hydrocarbons and unstable sources like Iran. This is good for the United States." (Condoleezza Rice, testifying before Senate Foreign Relations Committee, April 5, 2006).

About 13,000 MW of gas-fired plants are partially idling as we also have a shortage of gas in the country. If we had gone ahead with the LNG or the Iran Pipeline project, we could have removed some of the electricity shortage we have in the country today.

How is the nuclear deal related to the India US Strategic ties?

The Nuclear Deal is a part of a larger vision which seeks to subordinate India to the US's strategic vision. For the last two years, the Government has been taking a number of steps that align India to the US's strategic interests. It is known that the US strategic thinking calls for dominance in all possible theatres. In Asia, the US has been handicapped that it has only one major base -- Okinawa, Japan -- in East, South-east and South Asia. The only other base it has in this region is in the Indian Ocean in Diego Garcia. That is why the US's interest in making India as a junior partner in Asia.

One of the major steps was signing of the New Framework for India-US Defence Relationship in Washington on June 28, 2005, just prior to Bush Manmohan Singh Agreement of July 18, 2005. In the Agreement, it is stated, "U.S.-India defence relationship derives from a common belief in freedom, democracy, and the rule of law, and seeks to advance shared security interests". Considering that the Iraq invasion was justified by the US as "bringing democracy to West Asia", a reference to a shared belief in "democracy and rule of law" cannot be acceptable to the Indian people. The Defence Framework Agreement is also sweeping in its scope; it envisages a host of strategic and military relations -- joint exercises, joint planning, joint operations, and defence procurement. India has also joined in with the US, Japan and Australia (or what is called the trilateral nations) for naval exercises in the Bay of Bengal, as a part of this.

The Manmohan Singh Bush agreement was followed immediately by India's two votes against Iran in the International Atomic Energy Authority (IAEA). Senator Lugar in his opening remarks in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee had noted, approvingly, "We have already seen strategic benefits from our improving relationship with India. India's votes at the IAEA on the Iran issue last September and this past February demonstrate that New Delhi is able and willing to adjust its traditional foreign policies and play a constructive role on international issues." Manmohan Singh's oft-repeated claims that India's foreign policy would not change due to this Deal, is not borne out by his Governments' record, especially when the US officials are busy selling the agreement to the US Congress on the strategic value of India aligning with the US as a consequence of this agreement.

Currently, the Manmohan Singh Government is negotiating a Logistics and Service Agreement. It essentially allows refuelling and complete access to Indian facilities for all US ships and aircraft. The US navy can bomb Iraq and Iran and then come to India's ports for rest, recreation and refuelling, before going back for another round of hostilities. Step by step, from a vote against Iran, we are now to become hosts to the US navy in US-Israel military misadventures in West Asia.

Launching the TecSar spy satellite for Israel, which is being used to plan military attacks on Iran and Syria, show the depth of the strategic ties that India already has developed with Israel. India is not only Israel's biggest arm-buyer, it also buys more arms from the Israeli arms industry than the Israeli defence forces.

The Logistics and Service Agreement as well as the Defence Framework Agreement have also requirements of "interoperability". This calls for both sides to have the same equipment so that military personnel of both sides can use each other's equipment and operate better together. This also means spares can be shared by the two sides. That is why such agreements invariably lead to buying of US arms, particularly expensive aircraft and missiles. Billions of dollars of aircraft and missile sales is now in the offing -- F16 Aircraft, missile systems and ships.

COMMITTEE FOR AN INDEPENDENT FOREIGN POLICY
NEW DELHI

Open Mike 22: "the deal" (discussion)

2008-07-24T21:26:00.000-05:00

Thursday Open Mike 22 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Indo-US Nuclear Cooperation Agreement, aka "the deal"
July 22, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive, #244
Austin TX 78746

Participants: Gaurav, Murali

Here is a broad summary of what we discussed:

* the status of the deal (the UPA govt had won the trust vote, the politicians had largely failed to distinguish themselves in the debate though), the sordid and blatant corruption deals in the attempts to achieve the success or failure of the trust motion etc.

* does India need more nuclear power? the power shortage is real and important. but what about other alternatives - coal, oil, gas, hydel, wind, solar? and then we discussed how the govt could instead incentivize innovation and local production/consumption of cleaner energy like wind and solar through subsidies that would cost far less than nuclear plant construction. and contribute to more sustainable development initiatives like "green" (less-energy intensive) farming, construction, public transport etc.

* safety issues surrounding the operation of nuclear power plants and disposal of radioactive wastes: and we also discussed how these concerns are heightened in a poor country like India where human rights are much less important than developed nations like the US where human rights and safety are given a lot more prominence. If the Bhopal gas victims still have no justice, then why will a possible radiation leak disaster be any different?

* the rise of Mayawati and what that may mean: one interesting consequence of the whole trust vote saga has been the elevation to prominence of Mayawati, a dalit woman. How important this is can be gleaned by Laloo's quote during the debate (paraphrased): "...why are all these people saying Mayawati for PM? Will the upper-caste BJP ever support a dalit woman as PM?". We also talked about how our first reaction to Mayawati is usually that of a megalomaniacal woman and that is typically the only image portrayed by the media, and perhaps the truth is a lot more complex. In any case, having a dalit in the PM can at worst, only continue the status quo, and at best, can achieve a lot for the uplift of oppressed people.

An excellent article on how earth-shaking this rise of Mayawati is by MK Bhadrakumar, a format Indian diplomat:
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/JG22Df01.html

History never ceases to surprise. What began as the "Great Middle East" strategy in the minds of a neo-conservative Connecticut Yankee from Texas may end up in the democratization of India. Yes, paradoxically, the legacy of the George W Bush era for South Asia may turn out to be that the 60-year old democratization process in India took a quantum leap.

Indo-US nuclear deal: the nucleus of Manmohan's governance

2008-07-23T22:43:00.000-05:00

The nuclear deal with USA is at the core of all decisions taken by the current UPA government. For better or for worse. The story goes that the RTI and NREGA bills were passed by the UPA govt. on the insistence of the Left for the price of Left's support for the nuclear deal. The multi-industry commission responsible for creation of SEZs and further deals/subsidies with/for US corporations (like Dow Chemicals, for eg.) are also purported to be part of the nuclear deal negotiations. Irrespective of the motivations of the government, how useful is this deal to India and her people?

[1] The hoax of nuclear power
By Prof. Dipanjan Rai Chaudhuri

Prof. Rai Chaudhuri writes that nuclear energy is not a long term feasible energy source for India and argues that the Indo-US Nuclear deal is perpetuating this hoax. Prof. Rai Chaudhuri (now retired) is the former head of physics department at Presidency College, Kolkatta and has been active in civil rights movements in West Bengal for over two decades.

[2] Wrong Ends, Means, and Needs: Behind the U.S. Nuclear Deal With India
By Zia Mian and M.V.Ramana

The deal also will create the potential for the rapid buildup of a much larger Indian nuclear arsenal. It will bail out a failing Indian nuclear energy program that has had little regard either for the economics or the environmental and health consequences of its activities. It is also likely to offer little real benefit to India’s poor. It is not often that so much harm may be done to so many by so few.

Zia Mian is a research scientist in the program on science and global security at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School and M. V. Ramana is a faculty member at the Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies in Environment and Development in Bangalore, India.

[3] Sen. Obama and Sen. McCain both FOR the US-India nuclear deal

This article about the state of the US-India nuclear deal from the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation. The U.S.-India nuclear deal has been delayed since last summer, when India and the International Atomic Energy Agency negotiated a safeguards agreement. The Bush administration continues to pressure the Indian government to act on the nuclear deal in an effort to salvage what was to be one of President Bush's foreign policy achievements. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Joseph Biden (D-DE) warned in February that the deal must come before the U.S. Senate by June 2008 in order to win congressional approval this year. The question remains about the future of a civil nuclear agreement between the United States and India under the next U.S. administration.

Open Mike 22: Indo-US Nuclear Cooperation Agreement, aka "the deal"

2008-07-21T17:19:00.000-05:00

[posting from Murali's message on the groups]

Folks, we will have our next open mike session tomorrow, please try to make it.

Thursday Open Mike 22 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Indo-US Nuclear Cooperation Agreement, aka "the deal"
July 22, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive, #244
Austin TX 78746

This topic seems particularly appropriate now, with Manmohan Singh deciding that he is the PM of this one issue instead of the country and the myriad difficulties facing poor Indians, and with widespread opposition to the proposed "deal" based on a variety of reasons including ideology, patriotism, tactics (the way it is being concluded) and pure opportunism.

The issue has come to a head now with the Parliament debating the various arguments around nuclear cooperation with US and other countries as laid out by the agreement draft and the government has asked for a confidence motion (failing which, the government falls and new elections happen).

Some links below.

[1] Introduction and details about "the deal"

The Indo-US nuclear deal is the name commonly attributed to a bilateral pact between the United States of America and the Republic of India under which the United States will provide India access to civilian nuclear technology and fuel in exchange for IAEA-safeguards on India's civilian nuclear reactors.

An overview:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States-India_Peaceful_Atomic_Energy_Cooperation_Act

The 123 Agreement:
http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2007/aug/90050.htm

Draft version of India-IAEA Safeguards Agreement:
http://www.isis-online.org/publications/southasia/India_IAEA_safeguards.pdf

An archive of news, opinions, discussions and interviews:
http://ia.rediff.com/news/nukedeal05.html

[2] The trust vote in Parliament (voting is expected today so should be interesting to discuss this part as well)

A breathless archive of information, conjecture, gossip and astrology
http://ia.rediff.com/news/upavote08.html

[3] How democratic is India really?

(a) Various reports in the previous link suggest that different bribes were offered to and accepted by the MPs.
http://www.rediff.com/news/2008/jul/14nazar.htm
http://www.rediff.com/news/2008/jul/20inter1.htm

(b) Regardless of the corruption, does the Parliament's opinion or trust vote actually matter for the deal?
http://www.rediff.com/news/2008/jul/18guest1.htm

On July 20, 2005 -- that is, two days after Prime Minister Singh and US President George Bush issued a joint statement about the Indo-US nuclear deal -- Dr Singh addressed a press conference in Washington before returning to India. Smita Prakash of Asian News International asked him a pointed and prescient question: 'Mr Prime Minister, do you see any resistance coming forward from your allies and the opposition in putting the new India-US policy to practice? And will you seek a parliamentary consensus or approval to the new direction you seem to be taking in foreign policy?'
Dr Singh's reply was categorical, and befitting the prime minister of the world's largest democracy. 'Well, the Parliament in our country is sovereign,' he said. 'It goes without saying that we can move forward only on the basis of a broad national consensus.'
But look at the downhill road Dr Singh has traversed from then to July 20, 2008. Today is there a 'broad national consensus' in India in support of the Indo-US nuclear deal? No sane person can give an affirmative answer. And yet the PM has chosen to 'move forward' on the nuclear deal.
To know how far, indeed, he has moved forward by flouting his own assurance of adhering to the 'broad national consensus', it is instructive to refer to a front-page report by Radhika Ramaseshan in The Telegraph, Kolkata, on July 16. Titled 'Sink or survive, deal done', and quoting 'a highly placed official', the report said: 'The deal is 'done', whether the UPA survives the trust vote or not. The safeguards agreement, to be put before nuclear watchdog IAEA's board of governors at a special August 1 meeting, would stay on course, unaffected by politics back home...

(c) One-issue PM
http://www.rediff.com/news/2008/jun/19pm.htm
http://www.rediff.com/news/2008/jun/30guest2.htm
http://www.rediff.com/news/2008/jun/30guest.htm

(d) "Amend constitution to enable public debate" by Medha Patkar, Aruna Roy and Sandeep Pandey
http://www.rediff.com/news/2007/aug/23guest1.htm

[4] Nuclear power: does India need it?

(a) "if we do not do it now, history will not forgive us"
http://www.worldaffairsboard.com/south-asian-defense-topics/45678-apolitical-view-nuclear-deal-indias-energy-security.html

(b) Environmental concerns
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_effects_of_nuclear_power

(c) Economics of nuclear power plants
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economics_of_new_nuclear_power_plants

-Murali

Open Mike 21: Media - Trends, Role, etc.

2008-07-08T13:50:00.000-05:00

Thursday Open Mike 21 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Media - Trends, Role, etc.
July 8, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive, #244
Austin TX 78746

Open Mike 20: Sex education for children

2008-07-01T10:49:00.001-05:00

Thursday Open Mike 20 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Sex education for children
July 1, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive, #244
Austin TX 78746

Sex education in schools (links)

2008-06-27T02:05:00.000-05:00

Santhosh:

I hit upon this discussion forum on India together.
http://indiatogether.org/interact/2007/itr-000481.html

At various points I have witnessed discussions on ideas like pre-marital sex, sensuality and its relation to Indian culture. Divorce rates are used as an indicator to show breakdown of cultural ethos and the traditional family by conservatives while liberals see it as a gauge of independence or rights.

Here are more articles/reading material I found:

1. HIV/AIDS awareness and discrimination of HIV +ve children (This is related to sex education, because teachers are themselves perpetrators of such discrimination and are insensitive to the realities of the disease)
http://www.indiatogether.com/2007/sep/chi-aidskids.htm
http://www.indiatogether.com/2007/feb/hlt-aidskids.htm

2. Child Sexual Abuse (A taboo topic anywhere in India. But, work done by Thulir show how it can be battled. They are one of the few organizations struggling against this issue. The education aspects that they focus on are for 'parents', 'teachers' and finally 'students')
http://www.indiatogether.com/2007/apr/chi-tulir.htm

3. Articles on 'Sex education and state/moral action against it'
http://www.indiatogether.org/2007/apr/ksh-survival.htm
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/24/africa/letter.php

4. What is Sex education?
Here is a doctor's advice for parents on tough questions -
http://www.doctorndtv.com/topicsh/Sex%20education%20in%20children.asp

5. A more comprehensive article on India together on 'Sex Education' -
http://www.indiatogether.org/2005/dec/edu-notaboo.htm

Roopa:

A recent report in Indian Express about a survey by International Institute of Population Sciences (IIPS), Mumbai and Population Council, New Delhi: February 19, 2008
Youth want Sex Education: Survey Study by IIPS reveals lack of comprehensive knowledge about HIV/AIDS
http://www.indianexpress.com/story/274536.html

An article on Sex Education in AVERT website (charity organization that works on AIDS/HIV in Africa and India)
http://www.avert.org/sexedu.htm

Murali:

I knew that sex abuse of minors in India is fairly common, but had no idea it was this prevalent, from http://www.indiatogether.org/2005/dec/edu-notaboo.htm:

The Delhi-based Sakshi Violation Intervention Centre in a 1997 study that interviewed 350 school children, found that 63 per cent of the girl respondents had been sexually abused by a family member; 25 per cent raped, and over 30 per cent sexually abused by the father, grandfather or a male friend of the family. A 1999 study by the Mumbai-based Tata Institute of Social Sciences revealed that 58 of the 150 girls interviewed had been raped before they were 10 years old. RAHI, a Delhi-based organisation that provides support to victims of sexual abuse, reports that of the 1,000 upper and higher-middle class college students interviewed, 76 per cent had been abused as children, 31 per cent by someone known to the family and 40 per cent by a family member, and 50 per cent of them before the age of 12.

When surveys consistently reveal that more than 50% of girl children are sexually abused, it is astounding that so many men have gotten away with this. And the fact that this remains suppressed means that mothers and other female relatives, by their silence and inaction on this, are in effect accomplices for these crimes.

We should really fight for including meaningful sex education (being careful not to bring in wishy-washy stuff about Indian culture and pre-marital sex, or the dangers of "unnatural" sex etc). But even before that, we should ask Asha, AID etc to talk seriously about these issues to all schools they work with and see if extra lessons for sex education can be imparted...

Savitha:

Here is a link on how victims of child sex abuse are helped in the US (http://darkness2light.org/GetHelp/child-sexual-abuse-resources.asp)

The adults have a huge responsibility in the prevention of this crime (http://www.darkness2light.org/KnowAbout/adults_responsible.asp)

Sanjeev:

Anita and I had visited Puvidham in May. Including some parts from the report:

... We next went to the hostel. There was a caretaker, a teacher and an elder student working on cleaning and drying some of the organic produce. The hostel itself is a two-story building. The girls are in the lower floor and the boys in the upper. The staircase runs from inside the first room. Given that there are adolescents among both the boys and girls this a remarkable setup. Organizations have had a lot of trouble with the elder boys and girls staying at the same location. Usually, organizations try to introduce morality and a sense that all the people living in the organization are their brothers and sisters, etc, but this rarely works. I found the approach adopted by Meenakshi of treating the elder children as adults, talking about the changes and hormones in their body openly and placing the trust on the children as refreshingly mature and felt happy that this approach has worked well in these hostels...

Organic Manure and Humanure (links)

2008-06-27T01:55:00.000-05:00

Savitha:

Here is an inspiring documentary about breakthroughs in protecting the environment by transforming waste back into food/raw material, we can watch tomorrow. http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2007/05/15/18416351.php

Brief Description about this documentary:

In the early 90s, the American "green" architect William McDonough and German "green" chemist Michael Braungart teamed up to realise the Waste = Food principle in man-made products. They replace the old maxim "Cradle to Grave" with the new principle of "Cradle to Cradle", meaning that all products must be completely biodegradable in the biosphere and serve as food for the natural organisms there, and that all non-degradable material must be able to be used as high-quality raw material for new products in the techno-sphere.

They took their ideas regarding global waste problems to the Ford Motor Company, NIKE and the rapidly developing China. They helped Ford transform their heavily polluted manufacturing sites into green areas that are safe enough for children to play in. Due to their encouragement, NIKE has designed toxin-free running shoes that can be completely recycled. McDonough and Braungart were also invited to China to develop China's first ecologically sustainable model village.

Gaurav:

I am currently reading Cradle to Cradle. It is a very interesting book.

Any links for organic waste disposal and humanure?
http://www.yesmagazine.org/article.asp?id=2102 (posted on an Asha group)

Found a free book on Humanure for those interested -
http://www.jenkinspublishing.com/humanure_contents.html

Quoting Sanjeev from his post on another list -

Fundamentally, the concept of organic "waste" is an urban bane. It is
not necessarily an issue in rural India and even in places that it is,
the solutions are not necessarily what we get forced to use in the
cities (or locations with very limited space, no organic recycling,
etc).

There are a couple of solutions that have worked in the field:

1) one, are dry composting toilets.
http://smallisbeautiful.blogspot.com/2007/04/dry-composting-toilets.html
or
http://www.jenkinspublishing.com/humanure.html
2) gobar gas plants are capable of not just taking animal waste, but
humans one as well (through how the slurry is treated before it can be
used in the fields is different).

Humanure is a tricky subject to work on, because fundamentally it is a
taboo topic in our society. To work in this area requires
understanding of issues and conditions at a broad level. The two
biggest issues to solving the problem may not be the implementation,
but being able to look at the problem at a larger scale than making it
someone else's problem i.e. being able to think beyond what we have
seen all our lives (fighting against our conditioning that tells us
that what we have done is the only "good" way). Then, if we able to
work out a solution, being able to work with others to use it. This is
difficult in a village as people are looking up to us to understand
what is the "the good life" which is automatically interpreted as a
good city life with amenities including flushing your problems down
away from your habitat.

Gayatri:

Here's a really interesting article on composting. We just set up areas in our backyard to compost this weekend and the reduction in waste is a little astounding. This guide has definitely helped answer a lot of questions. We didn't use a specialized composting bin or anything just metal stakes and chicken wire.

http://www.compostguide.com/

Putting organic waste (from the kitchen) down the garbage disposal also poses another set of issues, since it takes so much more water to grind it up and then this slush has to be treated to extract the water from it. No idea where/how the remaining waste is disposed.

Open Mike 17: The Conflict of Kashmir

2008-05-29T13:47:00.000-05:00

Update: This topic has been postponed. Discussion on gender stereotypes continued in this session.

Thursday Open Mike 17 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: The Conflict of Kashmir
June 3, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive, #244
Austin TX 78746

Racism in the world and fighting it

2008-05-27T16:53:00.000-05:00

Related to our discussion a few weeks back on racism and affirmative action, here's an excellent article called 'Fighting Racism Globally' by Girish Mishra:

http://www.zcommunications.org/znet/viewArticle/17739

The article offers a high-level view of racism, the various kinds of racism ("individual, structural and ideological"), history of racism etc in various countries in the world, including casteism in India, and provides many examples of racism institutionalized in society even today. For instance,

a study prepared in 2003 that there was widespread discrimination against candidates for jobs on the basis of their names, which were perceived as "sounding black"

Also interestingly, some of the policies meant for affirmative action may infact achieve the opposite result if not correctly implemented. Policies adopted for prompt payment of loans and subsidies for black farmers ended up in extensive racial discrimination:

"In 1999, African-American farmers won a major civil rights settlement against the United States Department of Agriculture. They argued that the loans and subsidies they received were substantially lower than those for comparable white farmers. What made matters worse was the fact that Reagan-era budget cuts closed the U. S. D. A.'s civil rights office for 13 years, so most of the complaints filed during that time were never heard. To its credit, the department conducted an internal investigation and discovered that racial discrimination had not only occurred but had also been structurally and historically embedded in its operations.

Mishra then talks about the various efforts undertaken globally to fight racism, including UN conventions and declarations adopted, and the effects they have had. He also takes on some of the views of Samuel Huntington, currently leading barely-concealed racist theories against Hispanics, and shows how in general, the most successful societies have always been multi-racist and multi-cultural...

And argues that "there is a close connection between the struggle against racism and the fight against poverty.and for social, economic and cultural uplift of the people at large", which implies that current neo-liberalization and globalization trends further aggravate racial disparities.

Worth a read.

Open Mike 16: Working for society? or just social networking?

2008-05-27T13:44:00.000-05:00

Thursday Open Mike 16 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Public organizations like Asha, AID, Vibha: Charities, or Socio-economic empowering, or merely Social?
May 27, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive, #244
Austin TX 78746

Open Mike 15: Gender bias, stereotypes, and sensitization [India] - II

2008-05-19T13:43:00.000-05:00

Thursday Open Mike 15 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Gender bias, stereotypes and sensitization (India) - II
May 20, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive, #244
Austin TX 78746

Open Mike 14: Gender bias, stereotypes, and sensitization [India] - I

2008-05-12T14:54:00.000-05:00

Thursday Open Mike 14 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Gender bias, stereotypes and sensitization (India) - I
May 13, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive, #244
Austin TX 78746

Open Mike 14: Gender bias, stereotypes, and sensitization [India] (links)

2008-05-12T14:52:00.000-05:00

Here are links for tomorrow's topic. Many of the links here deal with the issue at a larger scale -- societal level, national level etc. One thing that we could also focus on, at the meeting tomorrow, is these issues at a more personal (individual) level.

[1] My favorite one: Gloria Steinem's famous speech -- "If Men Could Menstruate" http://www.haverford.edu/psych/ddavis/p109g/steinem.menstruate.html

[2] A UNICEF report (one of many in the State of the World's Children series) on Women Politicians, Gender Bias, and Policy-making in Rural India. By Lori Beaman, Esther Duflo, Rohini Pande, and Petia Topalova. http://www.unicef.org/sowc07/docs/beaman_duflo_pande_topalova.pdf This report is rather academic in its structure and methods of analysis, but there are interesting charts at the very end.

[3] India Together links:

Seven markers for gender balance -- indicators to assess gender sensitivity in governance, set up by the Center for Women's Development Studies
Who is a feminist? Paromita Vohra's film Unlimited Girls explores the ideas and experiences of feminism in contemporary urban India
Long and arduous road -- Educationists and social scientists are increasingly veering around to the view that persistent gender biases are rooted in India's failed education system. As a result, the search for gender parity must begin with guaranteed access to quality education for all.
What happens to girls? -- Despite quality education, the mindset of people is not changing in this country
Sexual harassment at work -- a practical guide
Raw deal for women journalists -- The recently released `Status of Women Journalists in India' report, commissioned by the National Commission for Women presents a disturbing picture of women journalists
Girls without power -- Despite islands of progress and even a paradoxical government-run success, the larger picture of girls' education and their empowerment is dismal. There is an enormous gap between fact and paper fiction, and the task for feminists and activists is cut out
A newborn's first right -- Less than 50 per cent of girl child births are being registered by parents because of gender bias, says former Census Commissioner Jayant Banthia, speaking at a Panchayats and Child Rights convention recently at New Delhi
Are girl students safe? - - The fleeting attention that is given to the rape of a girl in school hides the systematic harassment and violence that so many are subjected to - an important reason why girls drop out of the education system around the age of puberty
Barriers to girls' education -- We should not be too quick to attribute low literacy among girls to poverty alone. A number of other factors are just as responsible
Her mind, her country -- The State Council for Educational Research and Training in Delhi has taken a surprisingly different approach in its preparation of text books for students in classes 6-8 (gender sensitivity in curricula)

[4] Times Foundation has a collected set of links:

Literature on gender sensitization
Downloadable resources on Women's rights, etc. (mostly PDFs)
An article on Women's Entitlement to Property
Report of the Workshop on Gender Justice : Forging Partnership with Law Enforcement Agencies by Dr. Poornima Advani from National Commission for Women

[5] Gender bias perspectives from the developing world factsheet

[6] Gender and Language

Gender bias in an Indian language by G. Sankaranarayanan, in the Language in India journal (link to the online version) [the language in this article is Tamil]
Undoing gender stereotypes in Hindi by Anjali Pande

[7] A report on India Gender Profile by Bridge Institute of Development Studies. This report is more factual (factsheet) than anything else

[8] Gender stereotyping in advertising -- Majority advertisements featuring children show boys in diverse, challenging and macho roles while girls are portrayed in a more streotyped and objectified manner

[9] Promoting Gender Equity in Community Institutions: Evidence from Indigenous Communities in Western India by Kalpana Jain and Nihal Jain (pdf link)

[10] Gender stereotypes: Representation of men and women in Indian mass media -- a paper by Krishna Pokharel from Center for Civil Societies

Open Mike 13: US Fed, money matters, and the war in Iraq

2008-05-01T14:03:00.000-05:00

Thursday Open Mike 13 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: US Fed, money matters, and the war in Iraq
May 6, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive, #244
Austin TX 78746

Open Mike 12: Universal Health Care

2008-04-30T14:04:00.000-05:00

In open mike 12, we watched the PBS Frontline documentary Sick Around the World. Go to http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/sickaroundtheworld/ to watch the documentary as well to follow other links and analysis.

In short, the documentary traces (very successful implementations of) universal health care in 5 countries (England, Japan, Germany, Taiwan, and Switzerland) and summarizes three key points of learning from all these systems:

Insurance companies must accept everyone (with or without pre-existing conditions) and cannot make a profit on basic care.
Everybody is mandated to buy insurance, and the government pays the premium for the poor.
Doctors and hospitals have to accept one standard set of fixed prices.

The entire capitalist world criticized (and continues to do so) when Nehru famously called profit a dirty word. However, the world's most successful universal health care implementations in the richest capitalist countries, seem to be based on the tenet of eliminating profit in the business of basic health care! Sweet Irony!

A description of the documentary from the PBS site follows:

In Sick Around the World, FRONTLINE teams up with veteran Washington Post foreign correspondent T.R. Reid to find out how five other capitalist democracies -- the United Kingdom, Japan, Germany, Taiwan and Switzerland -- deliver health care, and what the United States might learn from their successes and their failures.

Reid's first stop is the U.K., where the government-run National Health Service (NHS) is funded through taxes. "Every single person who's born in the U.K. will use the NHS," says Whittington Hospital CEO David Sloman, "and none of them will be presented a bill at any point during that time." Often dismissed in America as "socialized medicine," the NHS is now trying some free-market tactics like "pay-for-performance," where doctors are paid more if they get good results controlling chronic diseases like diabetes. And now patients can choose where they go for medical procedures, forcing hospitals to compete head to head.

While such initiatives have helped reduce waiting times for elective surgeries, Times of London health editor Nigel Hawkes thinks the NHS hasn't made enough progress. "We're now in a world in which people are much more demanding, and I think that the NHS is not very effective at delivering in that modern, market-orientated world."

Reid reports next from Japan, which boasts the second largest economy and the best health statistics in the world. The Japanese go to the doctor three times as often as Americans, have more than twice as many MRI scans, use more drugs, and spend more days in the hospital. Yet Japan spends about half as much on health care per capita as the United States.

One secret to Japan's success? By law, everyone must buy health insurance -- either through an employer or a community plan -- and, unlike in the U.S., insurers cannot turn down a patient for a pre-existing illness, nor are they allowed to make a profit.

Reid's journey then takes him to Germany, the country that invented the concept of a national health care system. For its 80 million people, Germany offers universal health care, including medical, dental, mental health, homeopathy and spa treatment. Professor Karl Lauterbach, a member of the German parliament, describes it as "a system where the rich pay for the poor and where the ill are covered by the healthy." As they do in Japan, medical providers must charge standard prices. This keeps costs down, but it also means physicians in Germany earn between half and two-thirds as much as their U.S. counterparts.

In the 1990s, Taiwan researched many health care systems before settling on one where the government collects the money and pays providers. But the delivery of health care is left to the market. Every person in Taiwan has a "smart card" containing all of his or her relevant health information, and bills are paid automatically. But the Taiwanese are spending too little to sustain their health care system, according to Princeton's Tsung-mei Cheng, who advised the Taiwanese government. "As we speak, the government is borrowing from banks to pay what there isn't enough to pay the providers," she told FRONTLINE.

Reid's last stop is Switzerland, a country which, like Taiwan, set out to reform a system that did not cover all its citizens. In 1994, a national referendum approved a law called LAMal ("the sickness"), which set up a universal health care system that, among other things, restricted insurance companies from making a profit on basic medical care. The Swiss example shows health care reform is possible, even in a highly capitalist country with powerful insurance and pharmaceutical companies.

Today, Swiss politicians from the right and left enthusiastically support universal health care. "Everybody has a right to health care," says Pascal Couchepin, the current president of Switzerland. "It is a profound need for people to be sure that if they are struck by destiny ... they can have a good health system."

Open Mike 12: Universal Health Care

2008-04-26T14:01:00.000-05:00

Thursday Open Mike 12 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Universal Health Care
April 29, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive, #244
Austin TX 78746

Open Mike 11: Global Food Crisis (links)

2008-04-21T13:49:00.000-05:00

From Gaurav on the mailing list:

For the topic of discussion- how about a discussion on the current global food crisis -

"The head of the United Nations' world food program says "a perfect storm" is hitting hungry people around the globe. The cost of food is soaring. Food riots have broken out in Indonesia, Pakistan, and Egypt, where the price of bread rose 10 times in a week. Afghanistan has asked for urgent help. Forty countries are judged to be at risk of serious hunger, or already suffering from it.

Here in America the number of people using food stamps is projected to be the highest since the program began in the 1960s."

1. The World Food Crisis - http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/10/opinion/10thu1.html

2. Hunger in America - http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/04112008/profile4.html

3. Asian Food Crisis - http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/04/18/asia/food.php

4. 30 Years ago Haiti grew all the rice it needed. What happened now? - http://www.counterpunch.org/quigley04212008.html

5. "India clocked in 94th in the Global Hunger Index - behind Ethiopia"
Indexing inhumanity, Indian style - article by Sainath - http://www.indiatogether.com/2007/nov/psa-index.htm

Open Mike 11: Global Food Crisis

2008-04-21T13:47:00.000-05:00

Thursday Open Mike 11 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Global Food Crisis
April 22, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive, #244
Austin TX 78746

Vandana Shiva: Globalisation Pills for Globalisation Ills: Offering the Disease as the Cure for India's Deepening Food and Agrarian Crisis

2008-04-13T13:55:00.000-05:00

Globalisation Pills for Globalisation Ills: Offering the Disease as the Cure for India's Deepening Food and Agrarian Crisis

Apr, 10 2008 By Vandana Shiva
Vandana Shiva's ZSpace Page / ZSpace

Over the last 15 years, India's food and agriculture systems have been severely destabilized as a result of policies of economic globalisation and trade liberalization. Two aspects of this destabilization are the agrarian crisis and the rise in food prices. Both have their roots in the same processes of globalisation. However, the government treats each separately and independently, and every false solution makes the crisis deeper.

The agrarian crisis has emerged as a result of the withdrawal of the state from public investment in agriculture, public supply of seeds and inputs, public procurement for public distribution of food. These functions have been increasingly handed over to corporate players who work for profits, not the food security of the poor or the livelihood security of farmers.

The World Bank imposed Structural Adjustment Programme of 1991, and the Rules of WTO that came into force in 1995 have jointly worked to dismantle the public framework for food sovereignty and food security and the forced integration of India's food and agriculture systems with the food and agricultural systems of rich countries.

This has resulted in deep agrarian crisis and an emerging food crisis, with farmers incomes crashing while food prices go through the rood. The food and agriculture ills the country faces are a direct result of policies of corporate globalisation. Yet it is the globalisation pill the government is offering as a cure for globalisation ills.

Prices of food started to rise as a result of India's domestic market being connected to global markets, especially through the imports of edible oil and wheat. In the early days of globalisation, the agribusiness that dominates trade lowered prices to grab markets. This is what happened with the dumping of soya in the 1990s. Now that global corporations like Cargill have created import dependency, they are increasing prices. Price fixing is a common practise of MNCs.

In addition to price fixing there is speculation through futures trading. And climate change as well as diversion of foods to biofuels are also adding an upward pressure on international prices. The increase in international prices provides a perfect reason to focus on food sovereignty. It makes both political and economic sense to focus on self-reliance in food and agriculture.

While India was being made dependent on imports of food staples, Indian agriculture was being shifted to growing cash crops for exports. The agriculture export zones were a major policy thrust. While the government has banned export of pulses and non-basmati rice, its priority to diverting land to fruits and vegetables and cotton for exports continues. This too has impact on food security and food self-reliance. Vegetables prices have also gone up. Why is there a ban on exports of pulses and no ban on exports of vegetables? Is it because powerful countries like U.S want to control the market of pulses, including selling to India? And will India continue its policy of being a supplier of cheap vegetables to rich consumers in the North while the poor in India are denied food? Instead of decoupling the domestic food economy from the unstable, speculative global market, the government is strengthening the coupling, thus introducing major turbulence in both production and prices.

Low import duty of edible oil had already had negative impact on our coconut farmers, mustard farmers, soya and groundnut farmers. The government has further lowered customs duty, which will aggravate the agrarian crisis for edible oil growers and also harm public health because the imported genetically engineered soya oil and palm oil are not really edible oils, they are industrial oils introduced into the food system by global agribusiness.

A year and a half ago edible oils carried an import duty of 99.4%. In late March the Government brought down the duty of palm oil from 45% to 20%. This has now been cut to zero.

Duty Changes

Basic Custom Prior to April 2008 Duty in percent From April 1, 2008

Crude Palm Oil 20 0
Refined Palm Oil 27.5 7.5
Crude Sunflower Oil 20 0
Refined Sunflower Oil 27.5 7.5
CrudeSoyabean Oil 40 0
Refined Soyabean Oil 45 7.5
(Business Line 2.4.08)

As a result of reduction of import duties on edible oils, the wholesale price of mustard oil came down from Rs. 80/kg to Rs. 68/- kg (Business Line 2.4.08). Since the duty cut has been announced just as the mustard is being harvested, mustard growers will face a deeper crisis than they are already facing.

Kerala Chief Minister, V.S. Achuthanandan has said that the Union Government's decision to withdraw duty on edible oils would be a big blow to Kerala as it would bring down the price of coconut, a major farm produce of the state (Hindu 2.4.08).

Instead of protecting our rich biodiversity of oilseeds and our healthy indigenous edible oil, the government is destroying our biodiversity and oil seed farmers to make us dependent on bad oils which will in anyway not be available in the future because they will be used to produce biofuels for the cars of the rich.

Mr. Achuthanandan said the right way to contain the prices of essential commodities was to strengthen the public distribution system. However, this too the government is dismantling.

First the universal PDS was destroyed and replaced by the TPDS on grounds that this would reduce public expenditure on food subsidies. However, the food subsidy bill has kept going up even while larger numbers go hungry. The wheat allocation for BPL category households has dropped from 7.34 million tones in 2005-06 to 5.5 m.t. in 2006-07 to 1:735 m.t in 2007-08. BPL households earn less than Rs.330 a month.

The reduction in off take led to a build up to stocks with FCI. This was used to open up markets to private players. The APMC Acts were dismantled. Global giants like Cargill, ITC, Lever, AWB bought up food grains and drove the prices up. The center had also dismantled the essential Commodities Act, which prevented hoarding and speculation. While the Government puts ads against hoarding, private mandis allow leagalised hoarding and speculation.

The seeds of the price rise were sown with the corporatisation of India's food markets. The artificial scarcity this created for the PDS system was then used as an excuse to import high cost low quality wheat, which further pushed up prices.

Increasing dependence on imports, will not solve the problem because international prices will keep going up under the triple pressure of speculation, climate change and biofuel and also because many countries Argentina, Ukraine and Russia have imposed export controls.

Neo liberal economist Bibek Debroy has welcomed the food crisis "the food crisis may finally catalyse agro reforms" he says in his article "No Time for Field Theories" (Indian Express 2.4.08). "Liberalisation and integration bring domestic prices closer to global prices.

Hence, Indian consumers will pay more for agro products, but pay less for manufactured products. That's the reform argument".

However, most poor Indians who are earning less than Rs. 20/- a day only spend on food - not on fridges and A.C's. They can only loose with rising food prices. What economists like Debroy forget is that globalisation links prices, but wages grow more unequal. Rising prices with lower incomes for the poor translates into hunger and famine. While Debroy might celebrate the rising prices of food in India due to integration of our food economy with the corporate controlled global food economy, the people of India are not celebrating. With 90% of the incomes of the poor, and 45 - 55% incomes of the average Indian going to food, the globalisation recipe does not work in a period of global rise in food prices.

The agrarian crisis and the rise in food prices have the same roots in globalisation policies, which have promoted the corporate interest and discounted the rights of farmers and consumers. These policies have been based on India growing export crops such as cotton and vegetables, and importing food staples such as wheat and edible oils. They have been based on dismantling the public systems on which agriculture and food security rests. The food crisis cannot be solved by pushing more trade liberalization and further undermining our food security and food sovereignty.

The solution to bringing food prices under control and ending farmers indebtedness and suicides are same - the promotion of food sovereignty based on maximizing nutrition per acre while lowering input costs, as well as on localization of distribution chains.

Globalisation ills need a localization pill. Not more globalisation.

Open Mike 10: PDS, NREGS (collected links)

2008-04-12T13:51:00.000-05:00

Santhosh:

A critical component to such schemes is also identification of BPL
(Below Poverty Line) families. Here is a campaign that LSS (Lok
Shikshan Sansthan) was involved with in Rajasthan.

http://studentorgs.utexas.edu/aidaustin/projects/lss-prayas/bpl/index.html
At the very minimum they use the BPL 2002 census for easy data
maintenanceand kind of track whether a family is BPL or not.

http://nrega.nic.in/presentations/critical_issues_new_distts.htm
http://nrega.nic.in/user_manual_nrega.pdf

There are also other schemes, like the government pension for
individuals in BPL families who are above 65 years old -
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Personal_Finance/Savings_Centre/Govt_may_give_old_age_pension_to_60_yrs_in_BPL/articleshow/2865746.cms

Murali:

This is an interesting summary/report of all the public schemes and programs related to food distribution, PDS, employment schemes etc. in India by a commissioner of the supreme court:

http://www.righttofoodindia.org/data/pds/comrs_sixthreport.doc

Some of the programs available: subsidized rice and wheat through PDS and Antyodaya, ICDS (Integrated child development services), mid-day meals, NSAP (National social assistance program), Annapurna, NREGA etc.

The Right To Food campaign website has more info and links as well:

http://www.righttofoodindia.org/
http://www.righttofoodindia.org/pds/pds_intro.html

Ani:

One of the consequences of PDS has been people moving away from
growing local crops for their subsistence. In many places, the
indigenous crops - usually millets, were grown. With the introduction
of cheap rice etc at the PDS, people find it much easier to buy the
rice and grow cash crops on their land. This has had all kinds of
impacts on the farmers, the soil and water. With PDS also supplying
very specific types of grain (usually rice, wheat and some dals), our
diets have changed accordingly and have become quite like
monocultures.

here are some articles that talks about traditional cropping and PDS:
http://www.indiatogether.org/agriculture/dds/cropsoftruth.htm
http://www.infochangeindia.org/agenda7_06.jsp

So PDS, in its avatar as a central scheme supplying specific kinds of
food, has had a huge impact on farming patterns, food habits,
livelihood, soil and water. Traditional crops that are essential to
food security, as we are now realising, are almost gone. I think NREGA
is likely to result in a situation where people with traditional
skills that might not be fetching them enough money will make use of
this scheme. Skills are lost and no new skill is being learnt in the
process. It might make sense in certain places - it started off to
help people in drought-prone areas but when floated all over the
country, it is not clear what impact this will have.

Open Mike 10: Subsidies, PDS, and NREGS (topic)

2008-04-09T12:13:00.000-05:00

Thursday Open Mike 10 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Subsidies, PDS, and NREGS
April 15, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Arvind & Ashwini's House.
4201 Monterey Oaks Blvd #1911
Austin TX 78749

Open Mike 9: Affirmative action in India -- more links

2008-04-09T12:01:00.000-05:00

In response to Arvind's question on geographical population %age versus reservation %age --

Here are the numbers for Tamilnadu:

Total population: 623 lakhs; reservation 69%
(TN doesnt classify as OBC -- they break it down into BC and MBC)

Backward Classes -- pop:289 lakhs (46.2%) -- reservation 30%
Most Backward and denotified tribes -- pop:129 lakhs (20.7%) -- reservation 20%
Scheduled Castes -- pop:118 lakhs (19%) -- reservation 18%
Scheduled Tribes -- pop: 7 lakhs (1.1%) -- reservation 1%
All others -- pop:80 lakhs (13%) -- open (no reservations) 31%

Even at 69% reservations, the reservation percentages are lesser than population percentages. In rest of India with 27% reservations, its clearly evident what the ratios are. I dont have a link which gives us population-wise percentage breakdown of OBC/SC/ST/Others at the national level. If someone can find that, please post.

best references for the TN numbers are:
[1] Tamilnadu government policy note on BC and MBC welfare:
http://www.tn.gov.in/policynotes/archives/policy2007-08/pdf/bcmbcwelfare.pdf
[2] Ravishankar Arunachalam's article on the mathematics of reservations:
http://studentorgs.utexas.edu/aidaustin/issue/reservation/Ravishankar.pdf

Also, to address the example that Ashwini was talking about, take a look at the national policy on creamy layer, from the Indian govt.'s National Commission for Backward Classes(NCBC) website:
http://ncbc.nic.in/html/creamylayer.htm
Particularly look at issue VI. Income/Wealth Test. That addresses the "economic" creamy layer who will not fall under reservation category.

Son(s) daughter(s) –
(a) Persons having gross annual income of Rs. 1 lakh or above or possessing wealth above the exemption limit as prescribed in the Wealth Act for a period of three consecutive years.
(b) Persons in Categories I, II, III and V-A who are not disentitled to the benefit of reservation but have income from other sources of wealth which will bring them within the income/wealth criteria mentioned in (a) above.

EXPLANATION:-
(i) Income from salaries or agricultural land shall not be clubbed;
(ii) The income criteria in terms of rupee will be modified taking into account the change in its value every three years. If the situation, however, so demands, the interregnum may be less.

The other categories are also quite illuminating in providing a picture of what the NCBC considers as privileges in the Indian society.

Another interesting link from the NCBC site is the set of guidelines that determine whether a community can be categorized as OBC.
http://ncbc.nic.in/html/guideline.htm

Thanks,
Vinod

Open Mike 9: Affirmative Action in India

2008-04-08T00:31:00.000-05:00

Folks, our next open mike session will be at our usual meeting place:

@ 8PM in Arvind & Ashwini's House.
4201 Monterey Oaks Blvd #1911
Austin TX 78749

My suggestion for the topic is Affirmative Action in India

Some links:

[1] Customary wikipedia definition

The term affirmative action describes policies aimed at a historically socio-politically non-dominant group (typically, minority men or women of all races) intended to promote access to education or employment. Motivation for affirmative action is a desire to redress the effects of past and current discrimination that is regarded as unfair...

[2] Reservations in India

Reservation in Indian law is a form of affirmative action whereby a percentage of seats are reserved in the Parliament of India, state legislative assemblies, union and state civil services, public sector units, union and state government departments and in all public and private educational institutions, except in the minority and religious educational institutions, for the socially and educationally backward classes of citizens or the Scheduled Castes and Tribes who are perceived by the government to be inadequately represented in these services and institutions.

[3] Arguments for and against reservations

There are several arguments provided both in support and in opposition to reservation. Some of the arguments on either side are often disputed by the other, while others are agreed upon by both sides, with a possible third solution proposed to accommodate both parties.

Pro-Reservation:
[4] Mandal Commission Report by Dinkar Sakrikar

The report of the Mandal Commission has generated a furious controversy. A peculiar feature is that the controversy is not being fought between the right and the left; on both sides of the divide are ranged both right and the left.

[5] Why Reservation for OBC is a Must by V.B. Rawat

[6] Reservations: a larger perspective by D. Parthasarathy, IIT Bombay
A fairly detailed paper with some interesting comparisons.

Going by the logic of anti-reservationists that merit alone and not accident of birth should be the criteria for seats or positions, one can ask why a son (or, rarely a daughter) should get the property of a parent when the parent dies.

Anti-Reservation:
[7] Youth for Equality
I believe this group was at the forefront of protests against the UPA government's institution of the Mandal commission recommendations.

Youth for Equality is a forum which was initiated by the students of the 5 medical colleges of Delhi, to bring together those Youth (irrespective of field/caste/class) who feel strongly against populist measures (reservations on basis of caste/religion) which are wrong, unjust and harmful to India's future.

[8] Some prominent personalities against reservation

Reservations for forward-caste poor?
[9] Diluting Mandal by M. S. Gill

...Gill used to be an Central Election Commissioner in India and is now a cabinet minister?
The move to extend reservation to the poor among the forward castes not only goes against the basic concept of affirmative action, it also violates the spirit of the Constitution.

Links by email from Santhosh:

Hi,

Here are some links that can help :

A PBS documentary on discrimination -
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/divided/etc/view.html

Here are a bunch of links that I think we should read up on -
http://studentorgs.utexas.edu/aidaustin/issue/reservation/

Very informative comparisons can be drawn on racism and affirmative
action in the US. Here is an article by UT prof, Bob Jensen -
http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~rjensen/freelance/whiteprivilege.htm

A paper on understanding merit -
http://home.iitk.ac.in/~amman/articles/amman_sociologizing_merit.pdf

Thanks,
Santhosh.

Open Mike 8: Open (topic)

2008-03-25T13:53:00.000-05:00

Thursday Open Mike 8 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Open
March 25, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Arvind & Ashwini's House.
4201 Monterey Oaks Blvd #1911
Austin TX 78749

Open Mike 7: Microfinance (links)

2008-03-18T10:36:00.000-05:00

Posting this here for Savi:

What is Micro-finance?

Refers to a movement that envisions "a world in which as many poor and near-poor households as possible" have permanent access to an appropriate range of high quality financial services, including not just credit but also savings, insurance, and fund transfers.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microfinance

[2] http://www.developmentgateway.com.au/jahia/Jahia/pid/2701

Difference between Microfinance and Microcredit

[1] http://www.microfinancegateway.com/section/faq#Q2

[2] http://library.thinkquest.org/05aug/00282/econ_finance.htm

More on micro-credit : http://library.thinkquest.org/05aug/00282/econ_credit.htm

What are the services offered by Microfinance??

[1] Saving (Pension plan, deposits )

[2] Insurance

[3] Fund transfer or remittance from abroad

[4] Loans (Emergency , short-term , long-term)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Needs_and_Services.jpg

A few Micro-finance Models (courtesy Sanjeev Ranganathan)

1) Creation of SHGs generally involves a savings group this in turn give out loans to their members e.g. MATS (Mutually Aided Thrift Society - Timbaktu). The funds are that of the group and there is a clear incentive in ensuring that the loans (their money) is repaid by other members of the group. All account keeping is done by the group that elects it's own leaders and organizations have a person only overlooking the accounts and giving training (neither are full time jobs).

While some local politics can exist e.g. the wife of the panchayat leader taking more loans than others, etc. But, a few rules, e.g. no loan without returning 75% of current loan and a small amount of account keeping can keep things fair.

2) Anawim had implemented the SHG concept in the following fashion. Creation of womens groups (6 months to 1 yr of running weekly meetings – there act as a platform for discussing issues faced by women in the community, maintaining minutes and if possible savings. But, the savings was not necessary). Next a loan was given to the entire group to maintain. They also ran an evening center for the children in the community and the interest generated from the loans would help run the center. The interest in maintaining proper accounts was in the interest in the education of their children.http://www.paadhai.org/First%20Year%20of%20PAADHAI-India.pdf

3) Timbaktu Organic (TC) has a micro-finance program for encouraging farmers to take up organic/low-cost farming. TC also serves as a link to market the goods if they do not get utilized locally. The reason to mention TC is their approach to raise the capital – they reach out to socially responsible individuals to fund their initiatives. A nominal 4% interest is available to the individuals on request, further if it is a really bad year, they commit to take care of the principal if not the interest. http://www.dorabjitatatrust.org/annual_rep/pdf/mnr_livelihood.pdf

4) Geneva-Global

Microfinances and Women Empowerment (Keeping Project Freedom in mind)

[1] http://www.kiva.org/about/microfinance/ (Question 9) [2] http://www.genfinance.info/

Microfinance: The Downside

[1] http://blog.perfectspace.com/2008/01/19/starting-your-own-microcredit-or-microfinance-franchise/#mf-problem

[2] When is microfinance NOT an appropiate tool?http://www.microfinancegateway.com/section/faq#Q5

[3] Why do MFIs charge such high interest rates to poor people? http://www.microfinancegateway.com/section/faq#Q6

[4] Chances of poverty alleviation: http://books.google.com/books?id=RvcMNBYvMnMC&pg=PA4&lpg=PA4&dq=downside+of+microfinance&source=web&ots=o2nx0UON0T&sig=zWlgZz2m-qSMeBFUE3BZuWOXdNQ&hl=en#PPA4,M1

[5] Link to NYT article on problems for microfinancing in Mexico

Open Mike 7: Microfinance (topic)

2008-03-17T21:59:00.000-05:00

Thursday Open Mike 7 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Microfinance
March 18, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Arvind & Ashwini's House.
4201 Monterey Oaks Blvd #1911
Austin TX 78749

Open Mike 6: Free Press in India (links)

2008-03-10T14:36:00.000-05:00

We'll be continuing our Racist India discussion from last week, since we came no where close to finishing anything. However, since at the end of the discussion (and as it happens, in many discussions), we were discussing freedom of press, I've titled the topic as Free Press in India.

Rajaram Mohan Roy, back in 1823, explained the importance of freedom of the press with extreme clarity, while protesting the British ruling to clamp down on local publications:

“….. a free press has never yet caused a revolution in any part of the world …….. whereas, where no freedom of the press existed and grievances consequently remained unrepresented, innumerable revolutions have taken place in all parts of the globe.”

“……..ever since the art of printing has become generally known among the Natives of Calcutta numerous Publications have been circulated in the Bengalee Language which by introducing free discussion among the Natives and inducing them to reflect and inquire after knowledge, have already served greatly to improve their minds and ameliorate their condition”.

Freedom of Press is supposed to be sine qua non for a democratic society. The question is how true is that in actuality? Adding a few links here related to freedom of press. Please add more.

[1] The Hindu, one of the few family owned papers still remaining so in India, published this article Kudos to Tata Motors in October 2004, blasting Mahindra & Mahindra. After the furore raised by the article, N Ram, the editor-in-chief, wrote an apology. Now, both the article and the apology are on the website and if you read the article, there is no link whatsoever to the apology.

[2] Krishnaprasad, a journalist, blogs on how the New Indian Express does not need old hands. Particularly interesting in this link is a scathing open letter from a former IE editor P. Venugopal to the editor-in-chief of the IE group Aditya Sinha.

[3] This is from Wikipedia:

The Indian Constitution, while not mentioning the word "press", provides for "the right to freedom of speech and expression" (Article 19(1) a). However this right is subject to restrictions under subclause (2), whereby this freedom can be restricted for reasons of "sovereignty and integrity of India, the security of the State, friendly relations with foreign States, public order, preserving decency, preserving morality, in relation to contempt of court, defamation, or incitement to an offence". Laws such as the Official Secrets Act and Prevention of Terrorism Act ^[2] (PoTA) have been used to limit press freedom. Under PoTA, person could be detained for up to six months for being in contact with a terrorist or terrorist group. PoTA was repealed in 2006, but the Official Secrets Act 1923 continues.

For the first half-century of independence, media control by the state was the major constraint on press freedom. Indira Gandhi famously stated in 1975 that All India Radio is "a Government organ, it is going to remain a Government organ..." ^[3] With the liberalization starting in the 1990s, private control of media has burgeoned, leading to increasing independence and greater scrutiny of government. Organizations like Tehelka and NDTV have been particularly influential, e.g. in bringing about the resignation of powerful Haryana minister Venod Sharma.

[4] A TheHindu report on a BBC finding that Indians prefer "peace and stability" over "free press".

[5] An interesting article titled One Way Street by Arvind Lavakare in Rediff.

[6] An explanation of Freedom of Press, who threatens it, what are the arguments, etc. in the context of India, from People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL).

[7] Article on Democracy and Freedom of Press in India from Project Monitor.

[8] Links from India Together:
(a) Media barons and press freedoms -- How relevant is the argument of a threat to freedom of the press in cases where the financial interests of a media baron could ostensibly conflict with that of the public? The question resurfaced recently in Andhra Pradesh over the Eenadu-Margadarsi controversy, writes B P Sanjay.

(b) Plight of the vulnerable -- Legislatures around the country are invoking privilege on all sorts of issues, even as the political parties condemn each other's actions to limit press freedom. Sevanti Ninan reports.

(c) An Interview on the Indian Press with Veerendrakumar -- M P Veerendrakumar is a staunch opponent of FDI. He predicts that the new deals signed in the Indian media will hit small and medium newspapers and open the floodgates to foreign control.

(d) Articles on the role of the press, and trends in media -- there are many articles of interest in this link.

Moving the link from Murali's comment into the post itself:

[9] Press Freedom Index: India's Rank
I guess it depends on how press freedom is defined: is it how much is available, or how much is availed of? India is ranked 120th in the world in press freedom in 2007 (down from rank 105 in 2006), so we know what the current trend is. http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=24025

Open Mike 6: Free Press in India (topic)

2008-03-10T14:35:00.000-05:00

We are changing the day of the OpenMike. Moving to Tuesdays to accommodate interested members. Looking forward to an increased participation now.

Thursday Open Mike 6 (now on Tuesday)
Topic: Free Press in India & Racist India Contd...
March 11, 2008 [Tuesday]
@ 8PM in Arvind & Ashwini's House.
4201 Monterey Oaks Blvd #1911
Austin TX 78749

Open Mike 5: Racist India (links)

2008-03-05T00:24:00.000-06:00

Many links. Many perspectives. Not endorsing one over the other. Read away. We can discuss one or the other or all.

[1] Discrimination by caste is outlawed in India, but it is a part of daily life
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/1495052.stm

[2] Symonds racially abused by monkey chants in Vadodara?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/cricket/7039776.stm
[3] and in Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai? (good picture, this one)
http://mksviews.files.wordpress.com/2007/10/wankers_wankhede_stadium.jpg
[4] apparently he just mistook antics for racism
http://cricket.expressindia.com/news/Symonds-mistook-antics-for-racism-Pawar/230126/
[5] India blast latest Harbhajan racism claims
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/main.jhtml?xml=/sport/2008/03/03/ucharb103.xml

[6] and India does get offended by racism towards herself -- Shilpa Shetty in Big Brother
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/news/archives/2007/01/19/big_brother_racism_debate_rages_in_india.html

[7] Caste and Racial Discrimination in India - Can the UN Help?
http://india_resource.tripod.com/caste.html

[8] The Stain that just wont wash, an article by Shivam Vij
http://www.shivamvij.com/2007/02/the-stain-that-just-wont-wash.html

[9] Does bollywood prefer fair women?
http://www.sepiamutiny.com/sepia/archives/001945.html

[10] Fair=Lovely?
http://vsequeira.blogspot.com/2005/07/fair-lovely.html

[11] Remote Racism to counter Bangalore-d jobs?
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/987643.cms

[12] India does not believe caste discrimination is racism
http://www.rediff.com/news/2001/sep/02caste.htm

[13] An Untouchable subject -- NPR on caste systems
http://www.npr.org/programs/specials/racism/010828.caste.html

[14] Dalit Freedom Network -- many interesting posts here
http://www.dalitnetwork.org/

[15] Casteism as Raceism and Is Caste Racism or what?
http://ambedkar.org/WCAR/Casteismas.htm
http://ambedkar.org/WCAR/IsCaste.htm

[16] Racism in North India?
http://www.boloji.com/wfs5/wfs677.htm

[17] On Racism and Censorhip, an article by Shashi Tharoor in TOI
http://www.shashitharoor.com/articles/toi/racism.php

[18] Racism in India: The arrogance of Power
http://www.ndtv.com/debate/showdebate.asp?show=1&archive=yes&story_id=197&template=&category=Humanstory

[19] Post-Colonial Racism in India
http://baltimorechronicle.com/052404RacisminIndia.shtml

[20] UPA govt. no less racist -- providing the other perspective
http://www.ivarta.com/columns/OL_070210.htm

Phew! There is no shortage of links! But I did have a great time researching this set.

Open Mike 5: Racist India (topic)

2008-03-05T00:22:00.000-06:00

Thursday Open Mike 5
Topic: Racist India
March 06, 2008 [Thursday]
@ 8PM in Arvind & Ashwini's House.
4201 Monterey Oaks Blvd #1911
Austin TX 78749

Open Mike 4: Westernization of India (collected links)

2008-02-26T16:43:00.001-06:00

Collecting links that folks have been sending around by email --

Savitha:

The topic for next week's discussion in TOM is : Westernization of India in all its flavors ranging from native customs, religion , social structure, literature , art , food habits , human conditions , work, etc.

Ponder about this for a bit over the weekend....More related material soon!

Santhosh:

For a different twist - we often hear the "westernization" leading to "immodest" dressing styles of women. Here is an article on the dual standards of the morality police and the heavy gender bias underlying many cases where the victims are blamed for the crime.
http://www.indiatogether.com/2008/feb/wom-dress.htm

Vinod:

and these men were arrested for "indecent clothing"!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7260314.stm

Santhosh:

Nobel laureate Amartya Sen, delivered a lecture at an UNESCO convention, titled "AN ASSESSMENT OF THE MILLENNIUM" - It addresses two myths :
1. The "pure" homogeneous pre-islamic culture in India - He analyzes historical events to show how Islam was integrated into Indian culture and what was the situation before the advent of Islam in India.
2. The idea of 'westernization' - He questions the basic idea of questioning 'westernization' :) - he attacks generalizations, he believes there should be more emphasis for the thought as such rather than its origins.

Part 1 - http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Pantheon/4789/India/Amratya1.htm
Part 2 - http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Pantheon/4789/India/Amratya2.htm

Increased Divorce rates - western influence on Indian 'culture' or more freedom for women ?
http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/mp/2002/09/23/stories/2002092300290200.htm

Morality codes have been espoused as part of religion in all corners of the world. It is rather sad when the 'state' curtails the freedom in the name of protecting 'morals' :
http://www.indiatogether.org/2007/aug/ksh-dont.htm - Delhi police on increased rape of women from north-eastern India
http://www.indiatogether.org/2006/jul/soc-dancebar.htm - Dance bar ban and the State of Maharashtra
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/1166055.stm - Cultural policing of valentine's day in India
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/2749667.stm - Hindu extremists and Islamist extremists against 'westernization' in different regions.

Open Mike 4: Westernization of India (topic)

2008-02-26T16:37:00.001-06:00

Details:
Thursday Open Mike
Topic: Westernization of India
February 28, 2008 [Thursday]
@ 8PM in Arvind & Ashwini's House.
4201 Monterey Oaks Blvd #1911
Austin TX 78749

Open Mike 3: Health Care (more links)

2008-02-21T18:11:00.000-06:00

Santhosh:

Its kind of interesting that a major player in the health insurance
industry is closely covering the presidential debates on health care
and providing 'insight'/'analysis' - http://www.health08.org/index.cfm

Ganesh:

One more...to some extent informative
http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/aboutus/mission/haveyouheard/medicine-costs-11-06/overview/1106_have-you-heard_ov.htm

Open Mike 3: Health Care (links)

2008-02-20T09:33:00.000-06:00

This Wikipedia article gives some background information about the health care systems in various countries, how much countries spend on health care, etc.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care

We can broadly discuss

- Universal health care vs. private health care
Arguing for universal health care in India - http://indiatogether.org/2005/oct/ksh-health.htm

- Role of the insurance companies in providing health-care
An article in yesterday's NYTimes - http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/19/business/19health.html

- High cost of medicines vs. funding for future research

- Is it okay to market drugs directly to consumers/patients?
http://www.pbs.org/now/science/scienceforsale.html
http://www.pbs.org/now/science/drugads.html

- Franchise model to provide health care
Link to such an enterprise in Kenya - http://www.pbs.org/now/enterprisingideas/cfw.html

- and since it is open mike.....anything else that comes up

Some more links to a lot more useful links -

http://www.pbs.org/now/classroom/healthcare.html#sites
http://www.pbs.org/now/classroom/medicare.html#sites

Couple of articles on state of healthcare in India
http://www.indiatogether.org/2006/oct/hlt-nocare.htm
http://indiatogether.com/2006/jan/psa-health.htm

Open Mike 3: Health Care (topic)

2008-02-20T09:31:00.000-06:00

Details:
Thursday Open Mike
Topic: Health Care
February 21, 2008 [Thursday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive #244
Austin TX 78746

Open Mike 2 : Uniform Civil Code etc. (a comment republished)

2008-02-14T18:04:00.000-06:00

I'm creating a new post of one of Santhosh's comments since the comments are hidden away from the main page. Lots of relevant points and interesting links in this comment post. Hence putting this up here.

Hi All,

In last TOM, one discussion led to another and we reached a point
where we talked about 'Religion and State' in the US. So, the general
thought was that religion and state are sufficiently separated in at
least how laws are formed. I was not so sure about it. Did some more
research to find that -

1. Legal cases regarding interpretation of laws and separating the
bible from rights/laws -
http://www.pbs.org/flashpointsusa/20040127/infocus/topic_02/

2. While its generally true that the federal constitution is free from
the mention of 'god', state constitutions are not -
http://www.usconstitution.net/states_god.html
( In fact, in Arkansas and maryland, if you don't believe in God, you
are constitutionally forbidden from being witnesses in a trial.)

3. When presidents form opinions on aspects like abortion or gay
marriage based on their faith or bible
(http://www.pbs.org/flashpointsusa/20040127/infocus/topic_03/index.html
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=33837), it
does mean that religion could play a role in the direction of law
making process.

4. If a presidential nominee can put an 'advtmt' mentioning himself as
a 'Christian Leader' (
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjtGgfhKIvo
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/27/us/politics/27adbox.html?_r=3&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&adxnnlx=1203354583-04/njadOVSrhAAvZSuRbkA&oref=slogin).
it again shows the belief of the nominee who is not hesitant to admit
most of his thought process would be based of what his faith taught
him. If elected, this faith could play a role in law making process.

Now, I sent these links to not discuss the merit vs demerits of
religion in state - but, just to understand that religion does
influence policies and law making process in many countries including
the US.

Thanks,
Santhosh.

Open Mike 2 : Uniform Civil Code etc. (minutes)

2008-02-14T17:57:00.000-06:00

We started the discussion with Uniform Civil Code and then it meandered after a rather desultory fashion.

* Discussion on Uniform Civil Code. Details of what is legal, and what is open to social interpretation. When is human rights violated and the law should step in, and when is the local community law applicable? Specifically talked about the details in issues of:
-- land holdings and property acquisition
-- marriages and divorces
-- inheritance and bequeaths

* Discussion on Prison systems, and death penalty. Should we ever have death penalties? What is the motivation of a prison system? Is it to isolate the bad elements of society (hide the problem) or is it to reform the harmful-non-conformists to become either conformists or harmless?

* Discussion on the freedom of press, and what level of personal privacy is legally considered okay to invade.

Open Mike 2 : Uniform Civil Code etc. (links)

2008-02-14T17:56:00.000-06:00

[1]Winds of change : The All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) recently suggested that the custom of the man declaring "talaq" at one go and divorcing his wife should be discouraged. It stopped short of drafting further reform to the marriage contract, but this decade is seeing muslim women asserting for more, says Kalpana Sharma.

[2] Obscuring the real issues : Opinion piece by Pratap Bhanu Mehta on Supreme Court judgement/recommendation related to Uniform Civil Code

[3]Unifying Personal Laws: By V.R.Krishna Iyer, retired supreme court justice

[4]Supreme Court Ruling that commented on UCC

[5]Open page on 'Hindu' : UCC and national integration

[6]Dissecting a directive : Book review

[7]India succession act amendments proposed by the NCW - National Commission for Women

[8]Hindu Code Bill

Open Mike 2 : Uniform Civil Code etc. (topic)

2008-02-14T15:05:00.001-06:00

Details:
Thursday Open Mike 2
Topic: Uniform Civil Code and other topics
February 14, 2008 [Thursday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive #244
Austin TX 78746

No session today

2008-02-07T11:19:00.000-06:00

Everyone seems to be at the Team Asha pre-race dinner at Bombay Express tonight. So no Thursday Open Mike session today. Potentially we'll have an informal version of it at Bombay Express itself.

Open Mike 1 : Land Acquisition and Land Reforms (minutes)

2008-02-01T00:40:00.000-06:00

Session I - Minutes/areas of discussion

Land Acquisition and Land Reforms

* Discussion on wall street journal article

* Land reforms turned into land acquisition.
- Zamindari system pre-independence was the reason for land reforms
- Land reforms were not implemented and land redistribution did not
happen to a large extent
- Now government uses the same laws and eminent domain to confiscate land

* Brief discussion on Land issues in other parts of the world - South africa and Brazil - implementation of Land reforms. India and China - Land acquisition by State.

* We moved on to discussion legal frameworks and what could be a possible solution in the case of SEZs. One suggestion was to repeal law that made sale of agricultural land impossible.

* Discussion led to forms of governance - how communities can have more say - more power/finances to local governments with a federal framework ?

* Discussion on corruption - why its most in India. Comparision to US. Why do we accept it as part of life ? - What is the solution - incentives - to be not corrupt and punishment when corrupt - Does the society need to encourage questioning of such corruption in the system, or will the solution actually cause such questioning to happen ?

* Discussion on the 9th Schedule - Tug of war for more power between Supreme court and legislative body. Discussion on how Supreme court can question any law and interpret the constitution and what constitutes a fundamental right. some discussion on judicial activism and specifics

Open Mike 1 : Land Acquisition and Land Reforms (links)

2008-01-31T17:13:00.000-06:00

[1] Shruti Rajagopalan's article "India's Property Wrongs" in The Wall Street Journal. This article gives a history behind how India came to have its current version of land laws in the constitution, and presents an interesting viewpoint into the Singur and Nandigram scenario. Shruti is a former research associate of the Public Interest Legal Support and Research Center.

[2] Land Research Action Network's backgrounder on India's Land Reforms. LRAN is a network of researchers and social movements that work towards promoting the right of individuals and communities to land. The backgrounder (in two parts online, or a single PDF) details the history of India's land reforms and its various issues and challenges. LRAN has studies on many countries. Links here to Brazil, South Africa, and Venezuela. This page has link to all the countries they've researched on.

[3] The Great Betrayal: Indian Land Reforms by Venu Govindu. Venu Govindu reviews Siddharth Dube's Words Like Freedom : Memoirs of an Impoverished Indian Family 1947-1997. Artcile in India Together. Other articles in India Together related to land issues are here.

[4] "Give me Land" is a BBC four-part series on struggles for land - it covers South Africa, India, China and Brazil.

[5] "Ninth Schedule: What the Supreme Court judgement means" an article by Indira Jaising in Rediff on the January 11, 2007 Supreme Court judgement. Indira Jaising is a senior Supreme Court lawyer.

[6] Agrarian Reform for a Liberal Pattern of Society? Karnataka's Land Policy and the New Dispensation. By Ronald Herring of Cornell University. (pdf link) To quote from the Abstract of the article:

It is puzzling how much the discourse of development has backed away from the seemingly central question of rural poverty: land. Elaborate rules concerning its distribution, rights, regulation, protection, utilities have multiple development objectives, but poverty alleviation, individual liberty and community revitalization have long been on the stated agenda throughout India -- with radically varying levels of effort and effect. The Karnataka Land Reforms Act [Amended] that came into force on March 1, l974, is in line with the vision of the founders. Its pattern reflects -- more so than in West Bengal, which is widely lauded for its agrarian reforms -- the conclusions of the Congress Agrarian Reforms Committee of l949 and promoted over time with variable enthusiasm by Union governments. Such agrarian reforms have been considered among the most important mechanisms for achieving a socialist pattern of society as indicated in the Preamble and Directive Principles of State Policy (Part IV) of the Constitution. Elaborate and careful policy thinking by the founders connected classic agrarian reforms with poverty alleviation. What happens to land policy as liberal economic policy replaces “socialism” as directive principle? There are widespread claims -- both normative and empirical -- of "reversal of land reforms" in various parts of India under pressure of new export strategies, globalization, and multiplication of sub-subsistence holdings over time. What are the implications of reforming the reforms for poverty alleviation under new conditions?

[7] Various articles on Land Tenure, Agrarian Structure, and Land Reform by Professor Frithjof Kuhnen. (html and pdf links to the articles on the page.) Dr. Kuhnen is a professor of Rural Development at the University of Göttingen.

[8] Impact of Agrarian Reform on Poverty by Celia M. Reyes on the reforms in the Philippines. (pdf link)

[9] World Forum on Agrarian Reform

[10]India together articles on Land Reforms and acquisition

Open Mike 1 : Land Acquisition and Land Reforms (topic)

2008-01-31T16:53:00.000-06:00

Details:
Thursday Open Mike
Topic: Land Acquisition and Land Reforms
January 31, 2008 [Thursday]
@ 8PM in Gaurav's House.
1781 Spyglass Drive #244
Austin TX 78746

Tonight's open mike will center around "Land Acquisition and Land Reforms". Just because that was the first topic I received. Anyway its open mike, so the discussions can go anywhere. I'll try to gather some information about this in different countries and such before the session.

Thursday Open Mike -- First Announcement

2008-01-31T16:49:00.000-06:00

Starting this thursday, we'll begin a series of "Thursday Open Mike" sessions. The idea behind this is to have dedicated time to discuss what folks think are important issues that need discussion to further understanding. There is no compulsion on the discussions at these sessions to have any practical outcomes in the immediate or any future, although it would be nice if it did. The primary motivation is purely selfish, its to further one's personal understanding on different issues. Lets plan on a 90 minute session, starting at 8PM. Please try to come by 7:45, so that we actually spend all the 90 minutes on the discussion.

A note on topics. There is no restriction on the topic, except that it needs to be something that folks can think about and formulate their own thoughts about it. For example, we could learn the history of nation boundaries, starting from a society where tribes demarcated their territories from neighboring tribes to the current day nation states and discuss what the use of nation boundaries really are. Another example could be how would you organize Indian govt. political system for maximum democratic participation. These are just examples. Please send me an email about what you would like to discuss and I'll send an announcement out on Wednesday as to what we will be discussing.

I am hoping this will be well attended. The more folks we have, the more inputs and varied viewpoints we will be able to gather. Please come, and please bring forward what you would like to discuss. Please forward this email to anyone you think will be interested in this. Looking forward to the first meeting this Thursday.

Thursday Open Mike (now on Tuesdays)

Freedom for Kashmir?

One Genius or Many Hard-working intelligent people?

Open Mike 24: Assessing pornography in a feminist framework

Open Mike 24: Assessing pornography in a feminist framework

Open Mike 23: Nelson Mandela

Nuclear power debate continues ...

FAQ: Indo US Nuclear Deal - less energy, more hype

Open Mike 22: "the deal" (discussion)

Indo-US nuclear deal: the nucleus of Manmohan's governance

Open Mike 22: Indo-US Nuclear Cooperation Agreement, aka "the deal"

Open Mike 21: Media - Trends, Role, etc.

Open Mike 20: Sex education for children

Sex education in schools (links)

Organic Manure and Humanure (links)

More links related to gender discussion

Open Mike 17: The Conflict of Kashmir

More gender links...

Racism in the world and fighting it

Open Mike 16: Working for society? or just social networking?

Open Mike 15: Gender bias, stereotypes, and sensitization [India] - II

Open Mike 14: Gender bias, stereotypes, and sensitization [India] - I

Open Mike 14: Gender bias, stereotypes, and sensitization [India] (links)

Open Mike 13: US Fed, money matters, and the war in Iraq

Open Mike 12: Universal Health Care

Open Mike 12: Universal Health Care

Open Mike 11: Global Food Crisis (links)

Open Mike 11: Global Food Crisis

Vandana Shiva: Globalisation Pills for Globalisation Ills: Offering the Disease as the Cure for India's Deepening Food and Agrarian Crisis

Globalisation Pills for Globalisation Ills: Offering the Disease as the Cure for India's Deepening Food and Agrarian Crisis

Open Mike 10: PDS, NREGS (collected links)

Open Mike 10: Subsidies, PDS, and NREGS (topic)

Open Mike 9: Affirmative action in India -- more links

Open Mike 9: Affirmative Action in India

More articles on free press (links)

Open Mike 8: Open (topic)

Open Mike 7: Microfinance (links)

Open Mike 7: Microfinance (topic)

Open Mike 6: Free Press in India (links)

Open Mike 6: Free Press in India (topic)

Open Mike 5: Racist India (links)

Open Mike 5: Racist India (topic)

Open Mike 4: Westernization of India (collected links)

Open Mike 4: Westernization of India (topic)

Open Mike 3: Health Care (more links)

Open Mike 3: Health Care (links)

Open Mike 3: Health Care (topic)

Open Mike 2 : Uniform Civil Code etc. (a comment republished)

Open Mike 2 : Uniform Civil Code etc. (minutes)

Open Mike 2 : Uniform Civil Code etc. (links)

Open Mike 2 : Uniform Civil Code etc. (topic)

No session today

Open Mike 1 : Land Acquisition and Land Reforms (minutes)

Open Mike 1 : Land Acquisition and Land Reforms (links)

Open Mike 1 : Land Acquisition and Land Reforms (topic)

Thursday Open Mike -- First Announcement