Issue 287

22 01 /03/2019 NEWS LITERATURE POLITICS FASHION ART & CULTURE KIDS RELIGION FILMS
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Hate filled warmongering must stop
As the reports of the Indian Air
Force preemptive strike on the Jaish-e-
Mohammad terror camps inside
Pakistan territory came, there was a
sense of gratitude for ordinary Indian
who felt that the terror camps must be
destroyed at all cost but the media and
those who want to use these bombing to
raise the political climate in their favor
have taken up charge and now in full
flow as if it is they who did this act.
Political reactions were as per their
policies and with much maturity. All
complimented our forces for their act of
bravery but the prime minister and BJP
leaders went on claiming as if it BJP’s
victory. It is the same people who during
the Uttarakhand tragedy or attack
on Taj did not give credit to the government
but made every effort to suggest
that the government was different than
the army and forces. Today, all the
political parties across the spectrum
have supported the Strike which is a
good sign and BJP and its leaders must
desist from taking credit of these
claims. Secondly, these issues are of
utmost importance and therefore it is
important to leave the army and the
Indian diplomacy to deal with the issue
and not convert into another hate propaganda
back home. India must remain
united facing this as attempt will be
there to create divisions.
The biggest casualty during the ‘war
time’ is truth particularly when media
become part of the propaganda machinery
of the governing class. India and
Pakistan media are competing with
each other in who can stoop low to the
level of ridiculousness. We are not even
allowing the army and the requisite
Ministry to handle it.
After the Pulwama, we felt proud of
the way CRPF officers send their categorical
message to the country that their
Jawans did not die to create religious
polarisation and hatred in the country. I
can say that the Ministry of External
Affairs Press briefing too was mature
and balanced. Of course, the claims and
figures mentioned are only as per the
‘information’ received. The best part
was when the Foreign Secretary Mr
Vijay Gokhle spoke in a fairly measured
way about ‘India’s ‘non-military preemptive
strike’ which clearly mean that
for India it was not a war against
Pakistan but specific target of ‘eliminating’
the terrorists camps and outfits.
Now, it is another matter whether those
Cairo, At least 20 people
were killed and more than 40
injured when a fire erupted
inside the main railway station in
Egypt’s capital Cairo on
Wednesday. The blaze broke out
after a train crash
in the station.
Dozens of ambulances
and firefighters
rushed to
the scene, state-run
Nile TV reported.
TV photographs
showed clouds of
black smoke billowing
out from
the main building
camps, terrorists, hatemongers or
Jehadis have been killed and whether
the threat to common Indians from these
terror outfits have now finished.
Frankly, it was not a press-conference
but a statement of India’s position after
crossing the LoC or International
Border. Now the ‘entertainment’ channels
are reporting from ‘sources’ that
over 300 terrorists were killed including
Yousuf Azhar, brother in law of Masood
Azhar, the chief of Jaish-e-Mohammad.
The point is how do our news reporters
come to the conclusion about the deaths
and the individual when the entire operation
was carried out in night and just
confined to bombing of a particular target
without any ground operations ?
Why the media cant keep quiet when
the military establishment has not spoken
about these things.
The problem is that war or military
can be used for short term process to
bring thing to a certain
level but ultimately we all
have to resort to political
process. India and
Pakistan can not absolve
themselves from the political process as
there is no other option. There are however,
people, both the sides who think
of eliminating or deleting communities
and countries from the world map.
Added with idiotic fulmination and
20 killed in Cairo
railway station fire
in the station. Train movements
to and from Cairo were suspended,
Xinhua news agency reported.
Eyewitnesses at a hospital
said the corpses were completely
burned.
hateful jingoism being played by the
corporate sponsored TV channels who
celebrate these stories of war when people
want peace,
During the war the level of rhetoric
grows and all this is highly patriarchical,
talks of machosim and create a
false narrative of your ‘strength’. The
biggest understanding of this is that
what Pakistan is facing today because
of the fanatic Islamic groups who are
extra-state actors and who think they
are the law unto themselves with army
actively backing them. It is these fanatics
whose shout is more visible than the
common person in the street who wish
friendly relations with India. The danger
of extra-state actors destroying
democratic and constitutional values in
India is equally powerful. We should be
more worried because
whatever formed of
democracy was here, it
By Vidya Bhushan Rawat
social and human rights activist
is better than any military
or dictatorial regime. We all now
who are the forces taking law in their
hand and hitting people at their will.
Democracy there was always fragile
and under control of the military but we
London : Silicon Valley billionaire
Michael Moritz and his
wife Harriet Heyman's charitable
foundation 'Crankstart' will be
the new supporter of the Booker
Prize, its trustees announced on
Thursday. The announcement
came a month after the Man
Group said it was ending its
sponsorship of the prestigious
award for literary fiction.
The new arrangement will
begin on June 1 after the 2019
Man Booker International Prize
winner announcement, which
will also mark the conclusion of
18 years of sponsorship by Man
Group, the Booker Prize
Foundation said.
Thereafter, the original prize
will once again be known as The
Booker Prize, while the prize for
literature in translation will
become The International Booker
Prize. "We are thrilled that The
Booker Prizes have found such
marvellous philanthropic supporters
in Crankstart, whose
founders share our vision and
values. With its support, we look
forward to developing initiatives
for The Booker to reach new
audiences of every generation
and background around the
world," Helena Kennedy, Chair
of the Trustees of the Booker
Prize Foundation said in a statement.
She said that with
Crankstart's backing, they will be
able to continue the charitable
activities of the Booker Prize
Foundation. She said the foundation
will work with the National
Literacy Trust in prisons, and
with Royal National Institute of
Blind People (RNIB), one of the
cant have the same in India. Our forces
have shown extremely professional
approach on the issue of being non
political but for the last few years we
are witnessing the political leadership
trying to reap political benefit of a military
action. The soldiers die for the
country and the politicians want to benefit
politically.
Geopolitical war games are difficult
to understand. It is surprising that India
did not speak anything about the suicide
attack on Iranian Revolutionary
Guards in which 27 of these guards
were killed and the Iranian Defence
Minister blamed Pakistan based militant
groups. Why India remain quiet to
this issue and did not attempt to find a
common thread of Pakistani support for
these extra state actors. It is also strange
that we were more than eager to
blame the Saudis who did not even
bother to make a statement of condemnation
of Pulwama killing. Was
India’s decision of ignoring Iran was
because of the fear of Americans
who want to isolate Iran ? Where is
the independent foreign policy ?
Even Afghanistan has blamed
Pakistan based Jehadi groups trying to
destablise their government but it is
surprising we do not have any common
strategy with these countries.
At the time when the President
UK's leading sight loss charities,
to make the shortlist accessible to
blind and partially sighted readers,
as well as in universities
around the UK. Crankstart was
established by Michael Moritz
and Harriet Heyman in 2000 to
support "the forgotten, the dispossessed,
the unfortunate, the
oppressed and causes where
some help makes all the difference".
"Neither of us can imagine a
day where we don't spend time
reading a book. The Booker
Prizes are ways of spreading the
word about the insights, discoveries,
pleasures and joy that
spring from great fiction," said
Moritz, a British venture capitalist
and author, born in Wales.
Crankstart has been organising
and supporting scholarship funds
Donald Trump and his North Korean
counterpart Kim Jong Un are meeting in
Vietnam which gives a new hope to the
world that ultimately nations will have
to speak to each other and take a clear
stand against forces which have state
patronage to destablise their neighbors.
Each country today has a problem
points and they need to resolve them
through creating better circumstances
and building confidence among people.
India has said that it did the ‘non
military preemptive strike’ on Pakistan
because there were specific intelligence
inputs that Jaish had planned to carry
more suicide attacks in India. Should
we think now that we will not have any
further escalation. Will Pakistan keep
quiet or respond ? Will they act against
the terror groups ? Saying that it does
not exists when they raise open threat is
basically a blatant lie and will justify
Indian action given the situation world
over when nation states have to take
care of their people and protect them.
The only thing is whether threat to people
at large will be reduced or end ?
I think ,It is time for all of us to stop
these jingoism and let the forces and the
diplomats handle the issue. We are not
afraid of government taking a decision
to protect people but our problem is the
fanatics back home trying to wage a war
against our own people simply because
we may not follow their political ideologies.
The thing is simple that armed
forces will protect us and may win us a
war but our biggest threat is from the
jingoism and hatred being spread on silver
screen by the totally corrupted
media which has taken the role of dividing
people and creating war hysteria.
We have trust in the maturity of our
forces but zero trust on these loudspeakers
who have no sense of accountability
and responsibility towards the
people. We hope good sense will prevail
and diplomatic efforts will made to
isolate the terror outfits and hatemongers
not only nationally but also internationally
so that we can wage a decisive
war against poverty, superstition,
discrimination and illiteracy as defeating
them only will make us a great
nation and a big power.
Vidya Bhushan Rawat is a social
and human rights activist. He blogs
at www.manukhsi.blogspot.com
twitter @freetohumanity
Email: vbrawat@gmail.com
BILLIONAIRE TO FUND THE BOOKER PRIZE
for students from low-income
households at the University of
Oxford and the University of
Chicago, among others. The
50,000 pound award is among the
most coveted literary honours and
apart from the global recognition
that the winning novels gets, the
Prize also boosts its sales manifold.
In the week following the
2017 winner announcement, for
instance, the sales of 'Lincoln in
the Bardo' by George Saunders
increased by 1,227 per cent.
Its list of winners includes
many of the giants of the last five
decades, from Salman Rushdie to
Margaret Atwood, Iris Murdoch
to J.M. Coetzee. The prize has
also recognised many authors
early in their careers, including
Eleanor Catton, Aravind Adiga
and Ben Okri.