Trouble Spots

Two major steel projects envisaging combined capacity of 18 million tons of steel production a year have not been able to make any progress for the last five years because of serious problems related to land acquisition from tribals and farmers. These are Korean steel major Posco’s 12 MTPA integrated steel plant and Tata Steel’s 6 MTPA plant.

Posco’s was the first major foreign direct investment proposal after the Orissa government invited big industrial groups to set up the state’s second steel plant after the public sector Rourkela steel plant. Though the state government earmarked 4004 acres of land, of which 2900 acres was forest land, Posco has not yet got the possession of the land. This, despite the fact that the Union ministry of environment and forest has given final clearance for acquiring forest land in Orissa for its steel plant project and the company has already deposited Rs 105 crore with the state government towards compensatory afforestation.

Posco has sought the state government’s help in acquiring land from the villagers after the people cultivating the land for betel leaf and prawns rejected a rehabilitation package announced by the company. The company has announced a compensation of Rs.75,000 per acre for the loss of land meant for betel vines, Rs.1 lakh per acre for prawn farms and Rs.75,000 per acre for cultivable land. But the package has failed to enthuse the locals.

“It is a dream compensation package. Yet, the villagers are adamant to vacate the land. This is nothing but bargaining for more compensation,” says Priyabrata Patnaik, the chairman and managing director of Industrial and Investment Development Corporation (IDCO), the nodal agency empowered to acquire land in the state.

A Posco spokesman, expressing concern at the delay in getting the possession of the land, said, “The company has already made substantial investment on the project in the last five years since the signing of the memorandum of understanding with the government; how long can we afford to wait for the land.”

The other project, which has still failed to take off is that of the Tata Steel which has proposed to set up a 6 MTPA integrated steel plant in Kalinganagar, an industrial estate being described by the state government as the ‘Steel Hub of India’, about 150 km from the state capital in Jajpur district.

The government has agreed to provide 3,471 acres of land, which it had acquired in 1992, to Tata Steel for setting up the plant. Of the allotted land, private ownership accounted for 2,755 acres impacting 562 core families which comprise of 1,195 nuclear families belonging to six revenue villages. While compensation under the land acquisition act was paid to them in 1992, the villagers were allowed to retain the possession and continue cultivation of land.

While as many as 791 families out of 1,195 families have relocated voluntarily, the remaining 404 families have refused to move out of the core area. It is these 404 families who have been opposing the project demanding land for land as part of the compensation, rather than the cash component. There have been violent clashes between anti and pro project as also between the protesting villagers and the police.

The proposed ‘world-class’ university of Vedanta on the Konarka-Puri coast is also facing protest from the villagers around the 6,000 acres of land allotted to Vedanta by the state government. The protesting villagers have not allowed Vedanta to take possession of the land. In the meantime, Lok Ayukta has ordered an inquiry into the alleged corruption in allocation of land from out of the land owned by the Jagannath Temple trust.

The 8,000-strong Dongaria tribe residing in the foothills of the Niyamgiri hill in Kalahandi district too have been carrying out a resistance movement against the mining of bauxite from the hill top on the ground that their tribal diety Niyamraja resides there and any mining activities would destroy the ecology of the region and deprive them of the their main source of livelihood, which is the forest. The ministry of environment is yet to give its clearance to Orissa Mining Corporation for carrying out mining of bauxite from the hill top. This has adversely impacted the alumina refinery of Vedanta at Lanjigarh.

Arcelor Mittal’s proposed steel plant in Keonjhar district too has not been able to take off due to stiff opposition from the people who are likely to displaced by the project. Though the Orissa government had committed to 8,000 acres in Keonjhar district for the proposed Arcelor Mittal steel plant at the time of signing the MoU in 2006, it has not yet been able to provide any land. The process has been delayed due to agitation by displaced families under the banner of Mittal Pratirodh Manch as most of the land is fertile agricultural land.

Agitations have also stalled allotment of land for setting up of a couple of thermal power plants, not on the grounds of displacement, but because these power plants would consume great amount of water at the cost of irrigation to cultivable land.

Orissa : Miners' Paradise

Miners’ Paradise

Orissa is experiencing the pangs of an unfolding industrial revolution that seeks to transform this poorest of the states of India into a power house of electricity, steel and aluminum

The slogan - ‘Mining Happiness’ - on the giant-sized bill board greets the alighting passengers at the Biju Patnaik Airport of Bhubaneswar. The same slogan, below the smiling faces of tribal children, runs on the signages posted on the electric poles that stand at regular intervals along the divider of the main four-lane road from the airport to the state secretariat and beyond to the swanky info city.

‘Mining Happiness’ is the catch-line of the recent multi-million-rupee multi-media advertisement campaign of the Vedanta Aluminum Limited, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the London Stock Exchange listed mining giant Vedanta Resources PLC. Vedanta’s advertisement campaign claims the company’s one million ton alumina refinery to be scaled up to five million tons at Lanjigarh in the state’s Kalahandi district, ill-famed for recurring droughts and starvation deaths, will wipe off poverty and bring about all-round development of the region.

Vedanta’s chief operating officer Mukesh Kumar says the refinery at Lanjigarh and the aluminum smelter at Jharsugda together would provide employment to over 20,000 people. Vedanta also plans to set up a university on 6,000 acres of land along the Konarka-Puri sea shore at an investment of Rs.15,000 crore. “We have committed to invest over Rs.60,000 crore in Orissa of which we have so far spent Rs.30,000 crore,” he adds.

The other eye-catching advertisement bill boards in the state capital are those of Tata Steel. These too are on similar lines, carrying the photographs of some tribal boys and girls who, the company says, are the future engineers, doctors and IT professionals, a dream that would be fulfilled once the company’s proposed 6 million ton integrated steel plant comes up in Kalinganagar of Jajpur district, 120 kms North-East of the state capital.

“Global as well as domestic companies started making a beeline to Orissa after 2003, evincing keen interest in setting up heavy industries in the field of steel, aluminum and thermal power all of which need minerals which are found in abundance in the state,” says Priyabrata Patnaik, chairman and managing director of Industrial Investment Development Corporation of Orissa (IDCO).


After the Naveen Patnaik government passed the Orissa Industries Facilitation Act of 2004 which envisaged a single window system for investors wishing to set up industries in the state, there was a rush of companies, both multi-national as well as domestic, for signing memorandum of understanding (MoUs) with the state government.

“Till 2003, there were only small-scale units for making pig iron, sponge iron and steel to the tune of 250,000 tons besides the 50-year-old public sector Rourkela Steel Plant. The new industrial policy brought about a drastic change. Today, as many as 49 companies have expressed their intent of setting up plants in Orissa, envisaging an investment of Rs. 198,149.40 crore to produce 75.66 million tons of steel per year,” says the IDCO CMD.

Korean steel giant POSCO, with a proposed investment of USD 12 billion (Rs 52,000 crore), was among the first major players with plans to construct a world-class, fully integrated steel plant in Orissa with annual production capacity of 12 million tons. Among the domestic players, Tata Steel signed an MoU with the state government in 2004 to set up a 6 MTPA plant.

“By 2015, Orissa would become an industrial power house, producing over 35-40 million tons of steel, 3 million tons of alumina and 1 million tons of aluminum annually while also generating over 30,000 MW of electricity through coal-based thermal power plants,” says Ashok Dalvai, state’s steel and mines secretary. “Of the 49 steel projects for which MoUs have been signed, five are operating fully while 24 have become partially operational,” he adds.

Besides sectors like steel, power, cement and aluminum, investment has also been proposed on ports, universities, hospitals and several SEZs. While Rs.20,000 crore of investment is planned for creating SEZs in 1,077 hectares, Rs. 15,000 is proposed to be invested in setting up the Vedanta university along the Konarka-Puri coast.

Several private ports are proposed to be set up along the state’s 480-km-long coast. The state government has identified as many as 14 sites where ports can be developed. Already, several companies have expressed interest in developing some of these ports. These include Gujarat’s Adani group near the Paradip port, Aditya Birla group’s S.L. Mining at the Chudamani port in Bhadrak district, Navajuga engineering of Hyderabad at Astaranga port in Puri district, Puri Ports Limited at Baliharchandi port also in Puri district and Good earth maritime of Madras at Bahuda muhana in Ganjam district. Already work on three private ports has started. These include the Gopalpur port by the Orissa Stevedores, Dhamra port jointly by TISCO and L&T and Jatadhari port by POSCO.

“The government, through IDCO has already acquired 121,000 acres of land and is in process of acquiring almost equal acreage more for the setting up of these industrial projects,” says the IDCO CMD. IDCO is the nodal agency for identifying and acquiring land both from the government and private parties at strategic locations. The acquired land is then allotted for setting up industries. IDCO extends help in identification of project site and collection of plan and schedule of land from the revenue authorities.

Despite a single-window system in place for getting clearance from revenue, forest, environment, water and electricity supply departments, and IDCO having been empowered for land acquisition, some of the major industrial projects including the proposed steel plants of the POSCO, the 12 – million-ton greenfield steel plant of Arcelor Mittal and Tata Steel and Vedanta’s existing alumina and aluminum plants and proposed world-class university are facing stiff resistance from the local residents, environmentalists and social activists.

As a result, Posco and Tata Steel have not been able to start work on their integrated steel plants, which together would have produced 18 MTPA. Both these steel giants had signed MoUs in 2004 and planned to start production by 2010. The civil construction of the Rs 5000-crore 1.5 million ton alumina refinery project of Utkal Alumina International Limited (UAIL), a subsidiary of the Aditya Birla Group (ABG), near Kasipur in Rayagada district too is facing opposition from the displaced and affected people of the project.

Though the Orissa government had committed to 8,000 acres in Keonjhar district for the proposed Arcelor Mittal steel plant at the time of signing the MoU in 2006, it has not yet been able to provide any land. The process has been delayed due to agitation by displaced families under the banner of Mittal Pratirodh Manch as most of the land is fertile agricultural land.

Though private companies have the option to negotiate land price directly with the farmers and buy it, the process is not always feasible because in most cases where the industries want to set up their units the land owners belong to the scheduled tribe or scheduled caste from whom land cannot be bought. So, the prospective investor has to be dependent on the state government which acquires land and then gives it out on lease to the industry.

This is in sharp contrast to the process of land acquisition in Gujarat where the prospective investors by land from the farmers directly while the state government’s role is that of only a facilitator. Private industries are also allotted land in the industrial estates already created by the Gujarat Industrial Development Corporation, the equivalent of Orissa’s IDCO.

It is the inability of IDCO to get the acquired land vacated by the occupant farmers which is proving to be the main stumbling block in the way of starting work on the proposed industrial projects. “We have been awaiting possession of the 4004 acres of land for more than five years now without any progress. The government has been telling us that an amicable solution to the impasse created because of people’s refusal to vacate the land would be found out soon. However, till date there is no sign of any solution,” says Simanta Mohanty, general manager, external relations, Posco.

“The protests by people against displacement are a part of democratic process. People are resorting to agitation and protests to extract as much compensation from the government and the industry as possible. Another reason behind these agitations is the prevailing inertia among the people who do not want any change in their lifestyle,” says mines and steel secretary Dalvai.

This reason may hold true for the farmers, fisher folk, weavers and other artisans engaged in various kinds of handicraft who perceive heavy industries as being the main cause of deprivation of their means of livelihood. The only industrial activity of the state so far has been related to mining of minerals. The employment in the mining sector, however, has been declining over the years due to mechanization. While there were 52,937 workers employed in the mining sector in 2000-01, their number declined to 49,176 by 2008, points out the State’s Economic Surveys presented to the Orissa Legislative Assembly.

Widening rich-poor divide

However, for the educated urban middle class the process of industrialization in the state has ushered in a new era of prosperity and ever increasing opportunities. The mushrooming of engineering colleges, numbering 53 in the state capital Bhubaneswar, and 50 in other main towns of the state, enrolling 52,000 students every year, is a pointer to the growing aspiration of the educated youth to make it to a comfortable career path. Private business schools and medical colleges, as well as institutions imparting other professional education too have come up in large number.

The schism between the urban rich and the rural poor has widened sharply in Orissa. According the Planning Commission, 46.60% of Orissa’s people lived below the poverty line in 2004-05, much higher than Bihar (32.50%), Madhya Pradesh (32.40%) and Uttar Pradesh (25.50%).
Millions of marginal farmers, landless labourers and craftsmen from the poverty-stricken districts of Ganjam, Bolangir, Koraput and Kalahandi of Western Orissa, bordering Andhra Pradesh and Chhattisgarh migrate as far as to Mumbai, Surat, Ahmedabad, Delhi and Punjab every year in search of employment. Reports of starvation deaths, suicides of weavers and farmers and selling of children as bonded labourers appear at regular intervals in regional and national newspapers.

Farmers of Jharsuguda, Bolangir, Angul, Dhenkanal and Kendrapada districts have been carrying on prolonged agitations against the state government’s decision to prioritize allocation of water to industries from major irrigation dams on the rivers Mahanadi and Brahmani.

“The Hirakud dam over river Mahanadi, one of independent India’s early multipurpose river valley projects, used to prevent floods in the coastal areas, provide electricity to factories and homes and supplied ample water in the canals to grow a second crop every year. Not anymore,” says Professor Rajkishor Meher of Nabakrushna Choudhury Centre for Development Studies in Bhubaneswar. “The dam has almost lost its principal objective of irrigation promotion and agricultural development in the region,” Meher says.

Quoting government records, he points out that as many as 3,509 farmers committed suicide in Orissa in the last 11 years. The opposition Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party have alleged that at least 53 farmers committed suicide in the state in the past one year. “The multipurpose dam now hardly generates 30 per cent of its installed hydro power capacity because of lack of adequate storage of water in the reservoir, obsolete technology and worn out machinery,” he adds.

Due to silting of the reservoir and canals the tail end areas do not get adequate irrigation water for the second crop. The area deprived of a second crop is almost one-third of the created irrigated potential in the command area. Availability of water for agriculture shall be reduced in future, as the area surrounding the reservoir is now witnessing fast industrial growth and mining of coal. Meher points out that before 1997 the total allocation of water to the industries of the region from the reservoir was 3,191,200 gallons per year. This has increased by 27 times in the past nine years and this is obviously at the cost of water for irrigation.

While farmers of villages in the command area of the Hirakud dam are facing acute shortage of water, in Bhubaneswar and elsewhere in the state, consumption of liquor and ganja (hemp) has increased manifold. State’s excise department figures reveal a three-fold jump in revenue from the sale Indian Made Foreign Liquor and country liquor between 2001-02 (Rs. 197.35 crore) and 2007-08 (Rs.524.83 crore). There were 1021 IMFL shops, 13 clubs and 37 beer bars and 152 shops selling country liquor in 2008.

In a situation reminiscent of the popular anti-liquor movement of the 1990s in Andhra Pradesh, women in several villages of Orissa have launched agitation against the opening of liquor shops in their area. The left-extremist Maoists too have made liquor shops their target in the pre-dominantly tribal districts of Kandhamal, Gajapati and Koraput, Balangir, and Kalahandi.

Drug and illegal mining

Along with increase in the consumption of liquor, the state has also witnessed an alarming rise in the cultivation of illegal ganja (hemp). In raids conducted by the excise department in 13 districts of Orissa during 2007-08, 3.12 million hemp plants worth over Rs. 312 crore were detected and destroyed.

A commission of inquiring headed by Justice P K Mohanty found the involvement of Maoists in the multi-crore-rupee ganja cultivation in Orissa specially in the hilly and inaccessible areas of the state. In March this year, Dambaru Bagha, the district president of the youth wing of the ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD) of Maoist-bastion Malkangiri, was arrested from Lucknow with 3,000 kg of ganja in a truck. This was just the tip of the illegal drugs ice-berg.

Equally nefarious racket, which came to light recently, is that of illegal mining of iron, chromite and manganese ores running into over Rs.14,000 crore. The racket came to light following sinking of an iron-ore laden ship from Mongolia named ‘Black Rose’ off the Paradip port. It was laden with 23,847 tons of iron ore. The ship had forged documents of another ship named ‘Toros Pearl’. The owner of the ship operated two ships under the name of ‘Black Rose’ for shipping out iron ore from Orissa illegally.

Investigations by the state vigilance department and documents brought under the RTI Act showed that over last 6-7 years more than half a dozen leading mining and steel companies dug out iron, chromite and manganese ores than the amount they were allowed thanks to lax supervision of officials of the Orissa Pollution Control Board, Indian Bureau of Mines, state mines department, forest department, district collector and Ministry of Environment and Forests.

Documents obtained from the Orissa Pollution Control Board show that the biggest violator could be one of the country’s leading industrial group. The company mined 206 lakh tons of iron ore in excess of its permitted limit of 25.86 lakh ton from two mines (Kasia and Jiling-Longalata) of Keonjhar district between 2001-02 and 2005-06. By conservative estimates, the total market value of the excess iron ore mined was Rs 4269 crores. The permissible limit for mining of minerals in a year varies from mine to mine, based on the reserves it has, and is fixed by the Indian Bureau of Mines.

“Illegal mining is rampant in Orissa. Of the 595 mining lease issued by the state government, only 245 are valid, the rest 351 are continuing to carry out mining even after their lease period has expired. They are doing so in collusion with the concerned officials,” alleges Rabi Das, president of Orissa Jana Sammilani (Orissa People’s Conference), who has filed a public interest petition in the Supreme Court demanding a CBI probe into the illegal mining scam. “The delay in renewing the mining leases by the state officials is the standard tactic adopted by them to extract grease money from the lessee companies,” alleges Das.

City of neo rich

The staggering amount of slush money in the hands of government officials, politicians and touts collected from private miners is getting reflected in their ostentatious spending on such luxury goods as jewelry, real estate and automobiles. Jewelry shops are doing roaring business in Bhubaneswar and Cuttack. Imported luxury cars on the roads are a common sight in the state capital.

The state capital, which did not even have a three-star hotel a decade ago, today boasts of five five-star hotels and over a dozen four-star hotels. The city also has a 9-hole golf course spread across 33 acres of land leased out to the club by IDCO. “The golf club has over 500 members of which about 80 participate in the game regularly”, says Srimoy Kar, an active golfer.

“The land prices in Bhubaneswar have sky rocketed in the last ten years, competing with the prices of prime property in metros like Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Bangalore. I had sold an apartment in Bhubaneswar at Rs. 1.50 lakh when I started my business here 20 years ago. Recently, I concluded a deal of a luxury apartment at Rs. 1.15 crore at Rs4,000 a square feet,” says Subhash Bhura, the Orissa chapter president of the Confederation of Real Estate Developers’ Associations of India (CREDAI), who is the managing director of Utkal Builders.

Most land in Bhubaneswar belong to the government as the city was planned and developed as the capital city of Orissa only after the formation of the state in 1948. “The government’s near total monopoly over the land and absence of any town planning has resulted in scarcity of land for the middle class and the poor. Nearly one-fourth of the city’s population lives in 108 slums,” points out Bhura.

With new building bylaws enacted a few months ago, the skyline of the city is expected to change within a few years as several multi-storeyed buildings have been proposed. Real estate developers from outside Orissa such as DLF, Cosmopolis and Vipul have proposed mega housing projects in the state capital.

Recent times have seen large scale retail chains such as Reliance, Vishal Mega Mart, Big Bazaar, Pantaloon, Spencer's opening their outlets in Bhubaneswar. Large corporations like DLF Universal and Reliance Industries have entered the real estate market in the city. DLF Limited is developing an Infopark spread over an area of 54 acres in the city. Expanding its business portfolio, the Kolkata-based Saraf Group, promoters of Forum Mart shopping malls is constructing another Shopping mall named Forum Lifestyle mall on a 550,000-sq ft plot of land in Bhubaneswar with 1,200 car parks.

IT and education hub

Bhubaneswar is home to several educational and research institutions of state and national importance including the Utkal University , Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar, the Institute of Physics, Indian Institute of Technology, National Institute of Science Education and Research (NISER), Institute of Mathematics and Applications (IMA), as well as over 30 other private colleges geared towards engineering, biotechnology, information technology and management.

Mining major Vedanta too has proposed to set up a ‘world-class’ University on a staggering 6,000 acres of land along the Konarka-Puri sea shore. The university got mired in controversy after the Lok Ayukta ordered an inquiry into the legality of allotment of a part of the land belonging to the Jagannath temple trust. People of neighbouring villages too have been protesting against the proposed university.

Bhubaneswar is emerging as a national education hub that is also being promoted as an Information Technology Investment Region (ITIR) by the government. A total of 40 square kilometer of land has been allocated for the purpose, out of which about 60% will be devoted to research and development. Two institutions of national importance, the IIT and NISER, Bhubaneswar will be located within this investment region.

The Info City was conceived as a five star park, under the Export Promotion Industrial Parks (EPIP) Scheme to create high quality infrastructure facilities for setting up Information Technology related industries. Infosys and Satyam Computer Services Ltd. have been present in Bhubaneswar since 1996-97. Its current head count stands at around 6000.

Infosys is a planning a second IT park near Khandagiri which will accommodate another 5000 IT professionals. Wipro's software development centre started operation in the city during February 2008. The Finland telecommunication company, Nethawk, has its India R&D center at Bhubaneswar. The Canadian giant, Gennum Corporation too has its India development centre at Bhubaneswar.

The new STP, christened as JSS software Technology park is located at Infocity to provide incubation and infrastructure facilities to new and young entrepreneurs in the MSME sector. The intelligent building of the JSS STP is spread across three acres and houses state-of-art technology to fulfill the growing demands of IT professionals. Infocity is considered as the biggest IT park in eastern India spread over an area of 350 acres.

Critique’s views

Leading academics, economists, environmentalists, wildlife experts, social activists and leaders of political parties – the opposition as well as a few dissidents of the ruling Biju Janata Dal – have expressed grave concern at what they describe as ‘lopsided’ and ‘skewed’ development of the poverty-stricken Orissa.

“Orissa’s mineral reserves may exhaust too soon due to fast exploitation. Orissa is exploiting bauxite at a much faster rate than it should be doing. The focus of policy makers has been on maximizing the revenues in the short run than maximizing the present value of all expected future revenues,” avers Banikant Mishra, professor of finance at the Xavier’s Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar.

“The widening gap between the urban rich and the rural poor, lack of development activities in poverty-stricken regions of Western and Northern Orissa leading to large-scale migration of marginal farmers and farm labourers to other states, starvation deaths, displacement of tribals from their homestead and land on account of land acquisition for heavy industries and depriving them of their means of livelihood, state violence against people protesting peacefully against their displacement are all contributing to the rising influence of left-extremist Maoists in the state,” Mishra warns.

“Inspite of abundant stock of natural and human resources, the state portrays a hopeless image of stark poverty - child sale and starvation deaths hitting the national headlines regularly. This is mainly because of the state’s lopsided policies. Though there has been a growth in the number of factories operating in the state, employment had registered a steady decline,” points out Biswajit Mohanty, a chartered accountant who heads the Wildlife Society of Orissa.

“Orissa has missed the opportunity of taking advantage of its rich mineral resources. Instead of giving out mining leases indiscriminately, the state should have first come out with a mining policy. The government should have constituted an expert committee comprising geologists, metallurgists, industry experts and elected representatives of people of the mineral rich areas which would have recommended a judicious strategy for the exploitation of minerals,” says former Union Steel and Mines minister Brajkishore Tripathy.

“I won’t be surprised if the industrial houses which have signed MoUs over the last 10 years to set up industries in the state start legal proceedings against the state government for not having been able to fulfill its promise of land, water and power to them,” he said, pointing out that the total requirement of power and water for these industries far exceeds the supply.

“The Naveen Patnaik government has traded with the industries, ignoring the law of the land and ignoring the problems of the people. Even in a single-window system, the government should have ensured that the proposed projects get all the required statutory clearances from the revenue, forest, environment, water supply and electricity departments,” says Bhakta Charan Das, the Congress Member of Parliament from the Kalahandi Lok Sabha constituency.

“The government should have also made mandatory for the investor companies to give guarantee for the inclusive growth of the region in which they set up their industries. Since the government has allowed heavy industries to draw water and electricity at the cost of the needs of the local population, people are up in arms against industrialization,” he says.

Labour pains

“These are just the normal pangs of industrialization which is yet to take off fully. The fruits of industrialization are yet to bear. Let the heavy industries in the areas of steel, aluminum and electricity be established first, downstream industries would follow automatically. Only then will the people of Orissa start benefitting from an industrially sound economy,” says Ashok Dalvai, the steel and mine secretary.

True, Orissa is witnessing the pangs of industrialization. For the first time after Independence, the poorest of the country’s state is experiencing the trials and tribulations of an agrarian economy moving on the fast track of industrial growth.

Malatidevi Choudhury: My Grandmother

Malati Choudhury (née Sen) was born in 1904 in an aristocratic Brahmo family. She had lost her father, Barrister Kumud Nath Sen, when she was only two and a half years old, and was brought up by her mother Snehalata Sen.

Malati’s family originally belonged to Kamarakhanda in Bikrampur, Dhaka, (now in Bangladesh), but her family members had settled in Simultala, Bihar. Snehalata Sen’s father was Beharilal Gupta, ICS. Ranjit Gupta, ICS, former Chief Secretary of West Bengal was Malati’s first cousin. His brother, the famous parliamentarian and former Home Minister, Indrajit Gupta is also her first cousin. Malati’s eldest brother, P. K. Sen Gupta,former Income Tax Commissioner, belonged to the Indian Revenue Service, and another brother, K. P. Sen, former Postmaster General, was from the Indian Postal Service.

(Photo on the left: On the cover of The Illustratred Weekly of India)

Being the youngest child of her parents, she was a darling of all her brothers and sister. Her mother Snehalata was a writer in her own right, and had translated some works of Tagore, as is seen from her book Jugalanjali. It is hard to believe that coming from a highly westernized and aristocratic family, Malati Choudhury could adopt a completely different life style.

(L-R P K Sen Gupta (her brother), Nabakrushna Choudhury, Surekha Sen Gupta nee Tagore (her sister-in-law and grand niece of Rabindranath Tagore), and Malatidevi Choudhury)

In an article entitled ‘Reminiscences of Santiniketan’, her mother had written: “Malati was very happy and benefited much from her residence at Viswa-Bharati as a student. The personal influence of Gurudev and his teachings, his patriotism and idealism, have influenced and guided Malati throughout her life.”

She had been fortunate enough to have been deeply influenced by both Tagore and Gandhi. It was the former at whose feet she learnt and acquired some rare values and principles of education, development, art and culture, which had been the guiding principles in her life; and it was the latter who had a magic spell on her and at whose instance she plunged herself in the freedom struggle. Malati came to Santiniketan in 1921, when she was sixteen, and lived there for a little more than six years. In those days Santiniketan was small and beautiful.

There were nine girls of her age living in the hostel called Notun Bari (new house) – Manjushree, Surekha (who later on became her sister-in-law), Eva, Satyabati, Latika, Saraju, Tapasi, Amita (mother of Professor Amartya Sen) and herself. They were attending classes in the open under the trees, learning embroidery, handicrafts, music, dancing, painting and gardening. Leonard Knight Elmhirst, an Englishman, was in charge of the Agricultural Institute at Surul in Sriniketan, and he used to encourage them in gardening.

Mr. Pearson, another Englishman, was also teaching them. It was from him that Malati got the inspiration to work for the tribals. Gurudev used to take classes on Balaka, when he was reading his poems from his book ‘Balaka’, and was explaining the same to them. Miss Stella Kramisch, who came to India at Gurudev’s invitation, taught them the principles of Indian Art and dancing. They were really happy in those days at Santiniketan.

During her stay at Santiniketan as a student, a young man from a well known family of Orissa, Nabakrushna Choudhuri, came there as a student. He came from Sabarmati Ashram at the instance of Gandhiji, to study at Santiniketan. There was also G. Ramachandran, B. Gopala Reddy, and Syed Mujtaba Ali. They are no more.

She got engaged to be married to Nabakrushna Choudhuri, and left Santiniketan in 1927. This was a turning point in her life. After her marriage, Orissa became her home and her area of activities. They settled in a small village named Anakhia, now in the Jagatsinghpur District of Orissa, where her husband started improved sugarcane cultivation. Apart from agriculture, establishing rapport with the surrounding villages was their main concern. In their concept and scheme of rural reconstruction, it is the people who were at the center of activities. Their development depended on their empowerment, which was again the result of education. They had started adult education work in the neighbouring villages.

Soon came the Salt Satyagraha, and they jumped at that. It was the greatest movement of mobilization and motivation, which were the dynamic components of adult education. During the freedom struggle they were activists using the principles of education and communication in creating a conducive environment for Satyagraha. Even as prisoners in the respective jails, they continued the educational activities like teaching fellow prisoners, organizing choral singing and disseminating Gandhiji’s teachings.

(House that Nabakrushna's father Gokulanand Choudhury built in Cuttack on the bank of Kathjodi river)

Malati Choudhury and Nabakrushna Choudhuri, in February 1933, organized the Utkal Congress Samajvadi Karmi Sangh, which later became the Orissa Provincial Branch of the All India Congress Socialist Party. After independence, Malati Choudhury got opportunities of translating her ideas into practice. As a member of the Constituent Assembly of India, and as the President of the Utkal Pradesh Congress Committee, she tried her best to emphasize the role of education and adult education in rural reconstruction.

When Nabakrushna Choudhuri became the Chief Minister of Orissa in 1951, she was assertive enough to focus the plight of the have-nots, particularly those belonging to the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes. Eventually she decided not to join politics, because Gandhiji had advised that all Congress activists need not join politics, but should work for and with the people with service as their goal.

(Chief minister Nabakrushna Choudhury with Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru)

Gandhiji used to call her \"Tofanee\" She was Tagore's favourite \"Minu\" As a young student at Santiniketan, she was quite famous for her outgoing personality, taking active part in Gurudev’s dance dramas and music sessions, as well as initiating innocent mischiefs in the community. Proverbial courage, sheer dynamism and a strong zeal to fight for the rights of the oppressed and have-nots were the dominant features of her character. She was frank and outspoken, and was never afraid of calling a spade a spade.

In 1934, she had accompanied Gandhiji in his “padayatra” in Orissa. After a daylong walk, he was obviously too tired to visit a Harijan village which was in his itinerary. The villagers, who had waited long, were disappointed, but were prepared to forgive Gandhiji for the minor lapse. Malati Choudhury did not spare Gandhiji, and told him point blank, “Bapu, you have not done the right thing.” Gandhiji apologized, and cooled her down with his disarming smile.

Even before Independence, she had established the Bajiraut Chhatravas at Angul in Orissa in 1946, and the Utkal Navajeevan Mandal, also at Angul, in 1948. The Bajiraut Chhatravas had its genesis in the Prajamandal Movement ( the resistance movement organized and sustained by the people ) and its initial activities were geared towards providing residential facilities and educational opportuinities to the children of Freedom Fighters.

(Malatidevi with Mahatma Gandhi in Noakhali, East Bengal)

Over the passage of time, there was a societal demand on the Bajiraut Chhatravas to provide educational facilities to the children belonging to scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, other backward classes and under-privileged sections of society coming from all over Orissa. Established in the memory of the twelve-year old boy Bajiraut, who sacrificed his life by disallowing the British forces to cross the river Brahmani by boat, the Bajiraut Chhatravas has become an institution of national importance. The Utkal Navajeevan Mandal is a voluntary organization of repute, engaged in rural development and tribal welfare in the rural and tribal areas of Orissa.

The State Resource Centre for Adult Education, which was established by the Government of India, under the auspices of the Utkal Navajeevan Mandal, at Angul in 1978, had done pioneering work in Adult Education.

Honours and Awards came to Malati Choudhury in quick succession: National Award for Child Welfare (1987), Jamnalal Bajaj Award (1988), Utkal Seva Sammaan (1994), Tagore

Literacy Award (1995), Honour by the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha on the occasion of the 50th Anniversary of the first sitting of the Constituent Assembly (1997), Honour by the State Social Welfare Advisory Board (1997), Honour by the Rajya Mahila Commission (1997), and last but not the least, the ‘Deshikottama (D.Litt. Honoris Causa) from her Alma Mater, Viswa-Bharati.

(Malatidevi's home in the campus of Bajiraut Chhatravas, Angul)

In 1988, she refused to receive the prestigious Jamnalal Bajaj Award from the hands of the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, because, according to her, Rajiv Gandhi had not done anything to promote Gandhian values.

On receiving the Tagore Literacy Award given by the Indian Adult Education Association, she had said: “I feel doubly honoured to receive the Award, which is named after Kabiguru Rabindranath Tagore, to commemorate his memorable achievements in bringing a synthesis among culture, music and aesthetics in evolving and practising his unique philosophy and principles of education. Like Rousseau, Gurudev did not want purposefulness, belonging to the adult mind, to be forced upon the children in school. He believed that once purposefulness was introduced, it brought torture to the child, as it went against the purpose of nature.

"According to Tagore, nature was the greatest of all teachers for the child. He had tremendous faith in the educational value of natural objects. Natural events like the beautiful sunrise and sunset, blossoming of flowers and singing of birds are the learning resources for children possessing the natural gift of learning things very easily."

"He had a great faith in the children’s natural way of learning. He did not insist on forced mental feeding as a result of which lessons become a form of torture. Gurudev considered artificial feeding of the mind to be of man’s most cruel and wasteful mistakes. According to him, the greatest possible gift for children was their own freedom to grow. Tagore also wanted the children to have another kind of freedom – the freedom of sympathy with all humanity, a freedom from all national and racial prejudices. Thus, his philosophy ofeducation is based on the ideal of the spiritual unity of all races.”

She had also said, “ Rabindranath was always following the ideal to realize, in and through education, the essential unity of man. The way in which he achieved that unity gave him a deep insight into the object of education and its problems.”

Malati Choudhury had organized the ‘Krusaka Andolana’ (Farmers Movement) as a part of the freedom struggle against the Zamindars, Landowners and Moneylenders, who were exploiting the poor. She had seen and experienced the untold sufferings of the people while walking through many villages in Orissa. She had also realized that women were victims of many superstitious beliefs, and they alone were to fight against the same for their own empowerment.

As a member of the Constituent Assembly of India, she used to feel restless, because she was not in tune with the wavelength of other members; and when Gandhiji’s famous Noakhali yatra began, she joined the same at the instance of Thakkarbappa. A dynamic person like her did not slow down her efforts after the Bajiraut Chhatravas, Utkal Navajeevan Mandal and the Postbasic School at Champatimunda, near Angul, were established. She had joined the Bhoodan Movement of Acharya Vinoba Bhave.

During the Emergency she raised her voice against the anti-people policy and oppressive measures adopted by the Government and was imprisoned. Malati Choudhury was a legendary figure. She had lived an eventful life of ninety-three years.

(Malatidevi with Naxalite leader Nagabhushan Patnaik whose death sentence she got commuted by President N Sanjeeva Reddy, who had served as office secretary of Orissa Congress when she was the state party president)

alice in fadderland

nubile alice was wandering one sunday morning when she suddenly fell into a gorge. she fell, fell, fell and just fell and hit the bottom with a thud. she found herself confronting a rabbit at the bottom of the gorge. the rabbit had a familiar ring about him. she wondered who the rabbit reminded her of. after much brain wracking, she remembered that the rabbit had striking resemblance with the logo of the playboy magazine her fadder kept hidden behind the pot in the toilet.

alice didnt particularly like the fadder after she observed him looking at her in that peculiar fashion which made all girls suspect elderly men. however, she tolerated him because her school headmistress had drilled into all the girls the slogan - fadder can never be wrong, and must be loved.

a staunch loyalist of the headmistress that she was, alice decided to give da fadder a chance. may be, da fadder was a nice old man and all the tales about him were just rumour. so, she meekly followed the rabbit.

rabbit, playfully, lead alice to a corner where the fadder was seated on a chair with the sticker on it which said, 'moderator'. on reaching the place, alice was aghast seeing the fadder looking at her lasciviously. 'hi, sexy babe,' da fadder said. alice was speechless. 'how can the fadder be so outrageously obvious,' she asked herself.

alice caught hold of the rabbit's tail and pleaded with him to take him out of the gorge.

Teacher who became a watchman

susheel pundit suddenly felt an urge to migrate and change his profession. similar to the spiderman story, susheel pundit was smitten by luvbug while on his daily morning ablutionary visit to the field on the outskirts of his village in the cowdung land. since he was carrying just one lota of water, he could not 'purify' the spot where the bug had bitten him.

the poison of the bug spread slowly upward in his body - from sri lanka to the foothill of himalaya. he felt a tingling effect in his head.

in keeping with the tradition ordained in the manu smriti, susheel had taken up teaching in his village school set up specially for the children of cowherds and shepherds.

the children all liked him so much that they made it their sport to tie up his pony tail to the rickety chair on which he sat cross-legged, making them learn by rote the basic principles of earth-shastra.

learning by rote was the only pedagogy he knew. making the students repeat one-liners like 'king is dead, long live the king', 'boss is always right', 'never question your teacher', 'report to the teacher of any suspicious activities', was his singular method of teaching. however ever since that bug bit him where it hurt the most, susheel pundit was not able to enjoy children's harmless pranks and had become extremely irritable.

even an innocuous 'good morning, punditji' on the blackboard scribbled by the back-bencher natthu dubey, was enough to make susheel pundit jump at the very first student who happened to be near him at that particular inauspicious moment.

the change in susheel pundit's behaviour had not gone unnoticed by the head masterni. susheel pundit had not given up his habitual ritualistic practice of paying obeisance to the masterni. and, yet, she noticed the change in him. the change was very subtle, which only she could notice as it was she who had given him his first and only job in the school, favouring him over the rest of the candidates.

susheel pundit was very fond of playing gulli dunda earlier. he would play this game, considered the most happening thing to do by the village damsels, on the sprawling mango orchard, every day after the school. he had stopped doing so last two weeks and switched over to playing ikkad dukkad with the highschool girls. since, no boy was around at this particular time the change in susheel pundit's habit did not become talk of the village.

however, the news was promptly conveyed to the masterni by kankuben punjabhai who, like the hariram nai of the film sholay fame, had become the official informer ever since she had failed in the eighth standard for the first time four years ago. the reason why the matter was promptly reported to masterni was that kanku punju had a glad eye on susheel pundit and didnt like the idea of his playing ikkad dukkad with the bright and smart school girls.

the masterni, though aware of kanku punju's motive, took serious note of susheel pundit's behaviorial change and called him in her chamber for a one-to-one discussion.

"SP are you aware what you have been doing of late?"

"what, your excellency?"

"you have stopped playing gulli danda and have switched over to ikkad dukkad. don't you pretend that i am cooking up a story," the masterni said fixing her gaze on susheel pundit. the masterni had mastered the art and craft of interrogation. her moon-shaped 'third eye' achieved what a spiral did for a hypnotist.

susheel pundit soon started singing like a canary.

"madam, please pardon me. i cant reveal where, how, and who bit me while i was offering my morning prayers. but ever since, i find it painful to teach the children. can you not make me the school watchman, please madam."

"alright. but, make sure you give me an intelligence report every morning and evening on the law and order situation in the campus," the masterni thundered.

"goes without saying, madam. you will get a report from me even on a holiday," said susheel pundit, his smile spread from ear to ear.

susheel gladly accepted the demotion and the accompanying salary cut to merrily blow the whistle on anyone he suspected of flouting the school rules.

epilogue: the children are missing their punditji whose pony tail they used to tie up with the rickety chair.

Jigetty Jig

All the boys and girls were tired of moving their legs and shaking their hind part in this mundane world.

"Why do we work so hard and to what end?" asked lady Videbottom.

"To earn our living, madam," squeaked Timothy Tomatowala.

"Shut up you imbecile" snubbed the lady, "Is that why your dumb parents have paid a fortune to send you to this unrecognized Ivy League B-school?"

"No madam. Then, I guess they sent us here to ensure that we learn how to jig. Shake, shake, move, move. Rock, rock, jump, jump," butted in Bigbelly Bajpaii.

"Smart boii," said the lady with a smile of a tom cat, smacking her lips only to hurriedly paint her lips with a crimson red lipstick.

"Come on boys and girls, let's all do something exciting. Let's form a community, a community of jiggers and jumpers," the lady proclaimed, pulling her turtle shell spectacles over her head, a practice she had copied from her school headmistress she looked upon during her fifth standard while sitting on the back bench.

"Brilliant madam, really super idea. No wonder, the director is so fond of you," chimed Spoony Sharma.

The lady's eyes lit up like the headlights of a 10-ton truck on the Agra-Jullundar highway.

She ordered the boys and girls to form a circle on the campus lawn and made them count their number. "Now all the odd numbers step forward and the even numbers stay with me," commanded the lady.

The odd numbered boys and girls were told to run to the canteen and fetch a cup of coffee each, while the even numbered ones were asked to fetch tea.

Drill and discipline were her mantra to sensitize and sanitize the students and prepare them for the rat race they were supposed to join after the graduation.

the drill done, the madam asked the august gathering to wait for her while she went to her workstation to catch up with the latest gossip doing the rounds in the cyberspace.

The madam having left, the boy's surreptiously took out the pint of beer they had hidden in the hip pockets, while the girls busied themselves applying mascara and lipstick.

"Wish the madam takes such breaks every 15 minutes to allow us to replenish our stock of beer from the canteen boy," muttered Moni Motwani. The canteen boy ran a spiritual business under the banner of 'Baba Bholenath' to earn some extra bucks.

"There comes the madam," warned Champak Chowky and the boys hurriedly disposed off the empty cans behind the hedge that lined the campus. The girls assumed their position looking all glum faced, seriousness writ large on their face.

"Good boiis and gals. here we go. Remember what I had told you in the class today? Practice your jigs and jumps to perfection. Only a good jig and a good jump will make you beat the world in the rat race," said the lady in a sombre voice, marking her speech with a baritone cough she had acquired with much practice.

These were parting words before she got into her Toyota Corolla car. She was in a hurry to to reach on time for her jiggy party at the Gymkhana Club.

Back to Music

Homage and Heritage -3

Overwhelmed and humiliated, the anguished Father, bent under the infirmities of age, runs once more to their succour, even like the hen covering her brood under her wings against death. He takes his abode among the sorrowing. He faces the Fiery Ordeal again and again and works miracles. He repeats to them his lasting message: "Not through hatred and ill-will ye shall seek to avenge yourselves. 'Vengeance is mine' sayeth the Lord. Grieve not; forsake your fear; work and strive for goodwill and unity. For know ye who are afflicted, that Love exalteth, Love alone triumphs."

And he gathered them around him evening after evening as was his wont, and prayed with them for the purification of their hearts, beseeching them and admonishing them and instructing them with his words of wisdom and cheer. They gathered in the ancient city under whose precincts mighty empires lay in dust and in whose neighbourhood his Great Predecessor taught Eternal Wisdom to Man from His Chariot on the battlefield.

But so that the Scriptures may be fulfilled, and that the world's Martyrdom may attain its perfection, behold! there comes on the scene, once more, the infamous Ashvathama - the perverse Assassin of Ages, the vile Brahmarakshasa with the eternal wound on his mangled head and condemned to everlasting life of a roving ghost, - the embodiment of the accumulated evil of his race. He comes unrepentant and unrelenting, aye, even with a gusto within, for his unholy design, and accomplishes his foul deed of calculated cold murder before the eyes of a staggered multitude, to the everlasting shame and humiliation of his nation.

To Thee, Father of our Nation! we pay our grateful reverent homage. We salute Thee. We rejoice in the midst of our tears and our shame. We rejoice rather than sorrow and are grateful that the mericful Providence spared Thee to us to accomplish our deliverance, however shameful and agonizing the aftermath. We glory in Thy having walked our earth. For Thou hast given to mankind new values and compelled obeisance from a recalcitrant world by challenging it once again to measure its own stature against them. Thou art indeed in the line of Thy recurring Predecessors - the Great Saviours of mankind. Thou didst come to fulfil the Scriptures and to fulfil the pledge made in the Song Celestial:

"For the protection of the Good, for the descruction of the Wicked, and for the firm establishment of righteousness on Earth, I am born again and again."

Even so through ages hast Thou lived and laboured again and again. All Thy life didst Thou wear Thy Crown of Thorns and dist bear Thy Cross, finding life's final fulfilment in surrendering it as a ransom for our own sins and shortcomings. Greater love, indeed, hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for goodwill among his fellowmen.

We salute Thee, Father of our Nation! None that hath received Thy Light shall walk in darkness.

(End)

Swami Anand

Homage and Heritage - 2

They came from distant lands and from across the seven seas. They came from all parts of the earth. And he taught them all and made them good men and women. Even like one of his great predecessors, - The Guru Gobind - he would make the sparrow hunt down the hawk, but with a different weapon. With patient labours of a lifetime extending over half a century and spread over the entire land, he worked on his people to forge his weapon and to temper it.

Out of dross he made precious metal; out of earth-clods he made material to challenge and defy the might of an insolent empire; to whose people he bore the greatest friendship, and yet whose end he ordained, even as Krishna had ordained the end of the arrogant Jadavas. He called upon the foreigner to quit the land which he had bled white and in which he had worked much inequity.

And behold! For the first time in human history the world witnessed an epic struggle of a whole nation locked for three decades in non-violent combat with the alien rulers so that her chains should break. A saga of peaceful peasantries challenging the might of established authority, armed to the teeth, by refusing to submit to its unjust levies, inviting upon themselves untold sufferings and living under conditions of a siege till the privations turn them and their cattle white; of millions throughout the length and breadth of the country defying salt laws in the face of lathis, tear-gas, horse-hoofs; women refusing to part with their pinch of salt till their bones dislodge; men tying their own hands with iron wires to prevent slackening of their grip on raided salt; of gallant men who would be counted among the very peak of any army, offering to be beaten or pounded to death, by official myrmidons, without so much as raising their eyelids in protest; of statesmen, savants, tribunes of their own people - objects of world adoration, leaders of men and of an age, who would adorn the halls of any international assembly -- accepting cheerfully to surrender long indefinite years of their great lives to be wasted in cold, dark, solitary dungeons on a par with felons; of the nation's Bards pouring forth the agony of an age before sobbing magistrates in crowded court-rooms; of apostles who walked the land bare-foot, broadcasting the New Gospel carrying neither purse nor shoes nor yet staves, pleading guilty against their accusers and urging the courts to inflict on them maximum penalties; of wandering monks offering to starve themselves to death in protest against outraged whomanhood through long agonizing fasts without a trace of ill-will towards the guilty; of frail little men offering to lay down their lives denying themselves in their prison cells all food and water till death do deliver them, and in the meanwhile coasxing their captors to administer 'without blame' 'some suitable poison' when their sufferings did annoy them; of street urchins proudly mounting the gallows after being court-martialled for bold pranks; of village peasants naively facing military reprisals, with no better armour than plywood planks hung in front of their chests; of whole masses of unarmed, undrilled men and women flinging themselves in blind abandon against bayonets, bullets, guns and bombs.

Righteousness the world over wailed in oblivion. Untruth was in excelsis. Naked Fascism masquerading in the garb of aggrieved innocence stalked the land. It maligned virtue with impunity. Truth was lynched. The stars in high heavens wept over the inequities and the vileness of man.

And against it all, in his indiganation, the Father of the Nation lay crouched and twisted on his Bed of Fire for the tenth time, challenging his accusers from behind the prison. And his protest rang through the world pentrating the Iron Curtain. His Great Disciple, who was to him more than his own son, and 'with whom my Father is well pleased', lay in a handful of ashes at the prison corner. And the gentle Mother of the Nation was to meet her millions no more. Outside the prison raged Revolution. The Empire shook, and his mighty accusers trembled. They fell flat. Their chagrin knew no bounds.

And behold! The Titan collapsed under the weight of his own inequities.

And he quitted; but not without upholding the disruptionist who clamoured for rending his own Mother's garments. Freedom came, but Her face was ghastly. Brother flew at the throat of brother, and women wept. Millions were uprooted and flung on the roadside. Men lost all their sense and shame, and they burned and killed and perpetrated unmentionable abominations. Cities swelled with fleeing men and wailing women. They cursed and called aloud for retribution.


(More to follow)

Homage and Heritage: Swami Anand

Two thousand years ago the Prince of Peace atoned for the sins of his fellow-men on earth by mounting the Cross with words of forgiveness and love for his persecutors. And though man felt ashamed and humiliated he did not mend his ways.

The primitive man hunted for food; in the middle ages he killed for glory. The supermen of our age stalked the globe with a technique of slaughter and enslavement in the wake of greed and exploitation. The earth was rent with weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. Humanity lay prostrate under the agony of unnamable outrages.

In the midst of all this clash and conflict came, once more, a Wise Man from the East. Like the Good Shepherd he shouldered the ailing sheep, the insulted indentured Indian, toiling far away from home, and comforted him and his tribe. With words soothing and life-giving, he sayeth unto them: "Come ye that grieve and are heavily laden. I bring to you good tidings, --the Gospel of Resistence."

And he shepherded his flock and ministered unto them in their afflictions with tenderness and affection. He taught the worm to turn. He taught little mothers to stand upright and resist racial arrogance and insult, marching with babes in their arms and courting prisons.

He sat among overbearing foreigners and pleaded his people's cause, disarming them with his courtesy and his integrity. He evoked their sympathy with his gentle sufferings and earned a great renown.

And behold, he returns homeward to his own people and concludes with them, once more, a new Covenant: "It has been said by those of old: 'Ye resist not evil', or 'resist evil with evil'. But I say unto you, resist evil within and without you, with the whole might of your soul; resist it with Non-violence, resist it with Truth, resist it without malice. Repent ye, and do penance for your sins, collective as well as individual. Eschew all violence, eschew all hatred, shed all fear and forge yourselves into finest weapnos of resistence. You are the salt of the earth. Ye are to establish once more, by testifying to it in and with your lives in this holy land of synthesis, the supremacy of soul over matter; of God over Mammon; of service over self-interest. And ye are to carry the Gospel of this non-violent resistance to the farthest ends of the earth. In this redeeming task, he who shall lose his life shall find it, and he who shall seek to save his life shall lose it."

And he sayeth unto them again:

"Despise no man; but believe in his innate goodness. Harbour no ill-will against him; only resist the evil that has seized him. Resist and suffer cheerfully with no thought of returning evil for evil. Shun all fear. Be brave and wield the weapon of Truth and non-violence, which is Love abounding. They are but the obverse and reverse of the same coin. To me there is no God other than this. It is my sole weapon and my refuge. And know ye, that it is not the weapon of the weak. It is for the bravest. Learn ye, therefore, to wield it against all your ills. It shall sustain you against the mightiest. For it is forged on the anvil of Love that exalteth and that abideth in God."

And behold! Great multitudes followed him.

And he covered the entire land with his journeys, plying his wheel, and with its thread linked men with men, - whole masses of them.

The toilers came from their fields and spinners from their hovels; fishermen left their nets, tradesmen their counters. Rich men, encumbered with large possessions, came too, in search of solace, and he lightened their burdens. Women came resurrected and awakened to the true dignity of their state. The untouchables came with their limbs withered and their souls crushed under the weight of age-old inequities. And he ministered unto them with all the passion of his soul and made them whole. He made them God's Chosen. Came also the publicans, the hated ones -- servants of Government -- who served the alien rulers and worked against their own country for a mess of pottage. And he called upon them to repent and turned many into humble servants of the dumb millions. Lepers came and he built them shelters and himself washed their wounds. Came also the pharisees, the learned ones, negotiators and peace-mongers. And he suffered them all and treated them with unfailing patience and tenderness.

(This is the first part of an unpublished manuscript of the writings of Swami Anand, a close associate of Mahatma Gandhi)

Ram and Rahim

When in 1906, young barrister Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi launched his satyagraha in South Africa against the discriminatory treatment being meted out to people of Indian origin, his chief lieutenants included Hindus, Muslims, Parsis, Dalits and Christians. Among his colleagues were also Chines, British and Germans. Indeed Gandhi was a Vishwamanav (global citizen) whose quest for truth could not be constricted by the consideration of caste, creed or colour.

When he set up the Satyagraha Ashram on the bank of the Sarbarmati river in Ahmedabad a decade later, Gandhiji nominated Imam Abdul Kadir Bawazeer, a Muslim priest who had courted jail in 1910 as a Satyagrahi in South Africa, as the vice-chairman of the ashram's managing committee. Bawazeer succeeded Gandhiji's secretary Mahadev Desai as the chairman of the ashram after the latter was arrested during the Salt Satyagraha in 1930. And, when Gandhiji was arrested, he nominated 76-year-old Justice Abbas Tayyabji to lead the Salt Satyagraha.

Gandhiji's Satyagraha ashram was a global village. Its inmates included Hindus, Jains, Muslims, Parsis and Christians. Even Miraben, the youngest daughter of an admiral of the British Royal Navy, was an ashram inmate, such broad was Gandhiji's concept of universal brotherhood.

When in 2002, a group of concerned citizens gathered at the satyagraha ashram to discuss ways to promote communal harmony, it was attacked by a mob crying 'Jai Shri Ram'. A few days back, the mob that had destroyed the mausoleum of Vali Deccani, a.k.a Vali Gujarati, the great poet credited with founding the composition of shaayari, was also shouting the same very war cry of 'Jai Shri Ram'.

Gandhiji had popularized the singing of the hymn:
"Raghupati Raghav Raja Ram, Pateet Paavan Sita Ram
Eeshwar, Allah Tere Naam, Sabko Sanmati De Bhagwan"

The Muslim, Christian and Parsi inmates of the satyagraha ashram sang the hymn with equal devotion as it was a prayer to one God who was known by different names and whose blessings the hymn sought so that good sense prevailed among all human beings.

But since December 6, 1992, when fanatic Hindu mobs demolished the Babri mosque at Ayodhya as an act of revenge against the 15th Century Moghul emperor, Babar, the chant of 'Jai Shri Ram' has assumed violent connotation, striking terror among the non-Hindus, specially Muslims whom the Hindu fanatics chided as 'Babar ki Aulad' (Descendants of the Moghul emperor).

Communal Trap

A cornered cat pounces at the throat of the one who has cornered it. Should the Muslims act likewise? Some of them did. The serial bomb blast in Mumbai was in retaliation to the demolition of the Babri mosque. So were several other acts of terrorism. But an act6 of terrorism triggers off state terrorism of greater maginitude. Besides, terrorism alienates the common people from a terrorist outfit.

An act of terrorism by members of the minority community helps reinforce the propaganda by Fascist forces that Muslims are anti-social elements who need to be dealt with an iron hand. It was because of the attack on the Akshardham temple complex in Gandhinagar and the assassinatioin of former home and revenue minister Haren Pandya that the police could terrorize the Muslims by subjecting a large number of youths to torture and then putting them behind bars under the provisions of the draconian POTA.

Violence breeds greater violence. Similarly, communalism of the majority community thrives on communalism of the minority community. Some religious and political leaders seek to encourage and strengthen orthodoxy among the Muslims on the plea that preserving a distinct identity is the only way to survive the onslaught by forces that seek to wipe out Islam. But by doing so, they add fuel to the fire of communalism on which Fascist forces thrive.

Another tendency seen among a few Muslim leaders is to accept the supremacy of the majority community and be rewarded with a share in power. Such Muslim leaders, who accept positions in the government or in the ruling party, play a second fiddle to the top leadership and come in handy for the Fascist regimes to tom-tom their 'secular' credentials. As happens with any fifth columnist, they become a subject of abject contempt among their own community even as their loyalty remains suspect in the eyes of the majority community.

A vast majority of Muslims are poor and illiterate, making them vulnerable to the machinations of politicians and the clergy. Politicians, irrespective of their party affiliations, view Muslims as a conglomerate of various monolithic, closely-knit clans each controlled by clerics and/or community leaders. In times of elections, politicians seek the support of these clerics and community leaders, who act as power-brokers.

Politicians, clerics and community leaders have shown little interest in the welfare and uplift of the common Muslims. On the contrary, they seem to have a vested-interest in keeping the masses illiterate and their attention diverted from such burning issues as education, poverty, unemployment, social and economic justice. The same holds true for the Hindutva forces too.

Karl Marx had described religion as the opiate of masses. The followers of Savarkar, Godse and Modi are proving Marx right in Gandhi's Gujarat.

Hate Campaign

Though there appears to be a surface calm in Gujarat, the Modi government and the Sangh Parivar continue to target the Muslims. The state government is out to subverting the process of justice to ensure that no one involved in the 2002 carnage is punished. The Best Bakery case in a glaring example of this. In the Best Bakery case, the session's court has acquitted all the 21 accused of killing 14 hapless people, including women and children, after the key witnesses were coerced by the local BJP MLA and his municipal councilor brother into retracting their statement. Similar has been the fate of most of the cases of heinous crimes in which BJP, VHP and RSS activists are the accused.

While those who had committed murder, rape, loot and arson are roaming fearlessly, the police is hunting down Muslim youths, foisting trumped up charges against them and arresting them under the draconian Prevention of Terrorist Activities Act (POTA). In most of the POTA cases, the charge leveled against the detained person is the same that he had been recruited by Pakistan's intelligence agency, ISI, after the Godhra carnage, taken to Pakistan, trained there in terror tactics and brought back to Gujarat to attack Hindu places of worship and kill leaders of the BJP and VHP.

In times of communial violence in Gujarat, the language press sheds its yellow and dons deep saffron. The Gujarati press has proved time and again that pen is mightier than a trishul (trident). With scant regard for journalistic ethics, the Gujarati press has been adding fuel to the fire by whipping up communal passions.

The Muslims in Gujarat are a hounded lot, condemned by the ruling party politicians (BJP and its VHP-RSS allies), a partisan police force and civil administration and a belligerent press. If this is not Fascism, what is it?

Saffron Surge

But it was chiefly because of some retrogressive action of the Congress government like the decision to nullify the Supreme Court's judgment on the Shah Bano case through an ordinance and Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi's move to throw open the Babri mosque for the devotees of Lord Ram, that gave a shot in the arm to communal elements among both the Hindus and Muslims.

It was Prime Minister V P Singh's decision to implement the recommendation of the Mandal commission on socially and economically backward classes that hastened the BJP to take up the issue of Ramjanmabhoomi temple in Ayodhya, lest the coming together of all the depressed classes - harijans, advisasis, other backward classes (OBCs) becomes a formidable obstacle to the Sangh Parivar's dream of turning India into a Hindurashtra.

The Sangh Parivar systematically went about recruiting and mobilizing harijans, adivasis and members of other backward classes for the Ramajanmabhoomi campaign. Through the campaign, the Sangh Parivar managed to 'sanskritize' and bring under the fold of Hindutva members of those communities who had been suffering the humiliation of untouchability for centuries. When the bricks meant for the construction of the Ram temple in Ayodhya were consecrated in a Dalit colony or a slum, those who participated in the ceremony felt equal to the caste Hindus.

Simultaneously, the Ramjanmabhoomi campaign portrayed the Muslims as 'enemies' of the country who had no place in the Hindurashtra. The Indian Constitution had rejected the two-nation theory by adopting secularism. Hence, what could not be achieved through constitutional means, the Sangh Parivar sought to achieve through unconstitutional and extra-parliamentary means by driving a communal wedge in the Indian society.

Polarization of society on communal lines has vastly benefited the BJP as is evident from the increasing strength of its members in both the Parliament and the various state assemblies. The communal carnage, which triggered off the ghastly memories of Nazi concentration camps, that shattered Gujarat between February and April 2002, was translated into a mandate for chief minister Narendra Modi to rule the state for yet another five years.

The Gujarat assembly election results porten a serious threat to the secular India because the BJP and its extra-parliamentary allies, the VHP, the Bajrang Dal and the RSS, have made it amply clear that they will be trying out the 'Gujarat Experiment' in the elections to the assemblies of six states later this year as also in the parliamentary general elections the next year.