The recent incident of Dalits smearing human excreta for saving their homes in a place called Savanur in Haveri district, Karnataka, one of the southern Indian states, has created diverse responses from civil society.

The most common response from the incident is that it is the ‘worst’ kind of protest anyone can do. Some people even may say ‘SHIT’!’ about the news!

Paul McCarthy's sculpture "Complex Shit" (2008)

After this news was carried by mainstream newspapers, the state government and the municipal authority have been questioned for allowing such practices (scavenging) in their state (Karnataka). Still the government has not been questioned on why they were thrown out of their homes, instead the anxieties of civil society seems to focus more on ‘why they were allowed to pour human excreta on their body’!

Here I quote Justice Nayak, the Chairman of The State Human Rights Commission (SHRC) — “The state government is undeniably guilty of continuing the system of manual scavenging despite reminders by the National Human Rights Commission and State Human Rights Commission”.

I would like to argue that the act of pouring shit on their own body in protest against State’s forceful eviction from their homes, is a political act, not only against the civil society, but also as a potent critique against the contemporary Dalit Movement in the country. However, as usual, attempts have been made by the mainstream media and civil society alike to divert the metaphorical intervention of scavengers trying to politicize shit from its political context. The protesters poured excreta on them not to claim they are still scavengers, instead excreta is the only option of protection for the bodies/families of the scavenging community, in the eventuality of a displacement. The act was an act of politicising Shit.

It is pathetic that not only the dominant mainstream, but also the so-called ‘Dalit’ intellectuals and activists seem to ignore and sideline the political significance of this intervention from the scavenging communities. Dalit Movement has been reduced to an “NGO” of late, and people who run the NGOs dealing with the scavenging community should understand that stopping the profession will not bring dignity to the community. Rather, I would argue that dignity can only be achieved by politicising the profession (while at the same time not encouraging the current generation to accept it as a profession). I would argue that ‘the profession’ has never been acknowledged by political theory. Whenever scavenging and scavengers are discussed, the trend is to pose the question vis-à-vis the pornographic and voyeuristic visualization of the act of scavenging, resulting in eliciting only sympathy/pity. This is one of the main reasons for the lack of social respect for scavenging communities among the masses, including Dalits. There are many books written on scavenging and even documentaries produced depicting the sorrowful facet of the profession and the lives of the scavenging community. However, the framework is still caught up in the paternalistic Gandhian mode. There is a need for the civil society actors (including Dalit activists) who are trying to support the cause of scavenging communities to re-think and re-formulate their agencies. Rather than adopt a philanthropic approach, they should politicise the community.

What do we usually think when the scavenging profession is discussed? Only a bucket and a pool of yellow shit! Its is unlikely for anyone to think their life to be an intense political struggle as well. This is primarily because of the way the profession is constructed in the mainstream. One should remember that the word Black was derogatory at one point of time, before it was politicised by the Black intellectuals. By the act of smearing their body with shit, the scavenging communities have questioned and challenged mainstream constructions about their identities.

Amidst all the opulence and glitter caste has always been there in most of the reality shows in Malayalam television channels. It was always-already present, difficult to render invisible. But, till the grand finale of the Star Singer show’s season four in Asianet, it hadn’t showed up in such proportions in public forums. Both, who celebrated Joby John’s victory and the others who considered it as `unfair’ had to address caste. The aggressive responses in the  cyberspace talks about caste, in one way or other. Even `reservation’ and `merit ‘have been mentioned in some of the responses. The main arguments against Joby’s victory are that he was not the `real’ winner, sms helped him win and that a `sympathy’ wave had worked in his favor. Did this happen? If so could this sympathy wave be of `caste’?

Two remarks, one made by MG Sreekumar , one of the show judges and another by Ranjini Haridas, the anchor, give us some clues. Ranjini told the audience“all of you know Joby’s background”. M G Sreekumar stated that the results have once again proved that the star singer show is a ‘transparent’ program. If we go back to the previous seasons of Star Singer the elimination of popular contestants Sannidanandan and Somadas had triggered uncomfortable questions about the show and the judging panel/pattern and the politics of marginality had come to the fore. This must have been a dilemma for the producers. One of the major factors that worked in their favor could be that Joby had `classical ‘music training. Even though the show claims that their search is for a `versatile’ singer it has always been a particular type of singer. The winners in the previous star singer contests were all trained in Carnatic music. – Najim Arshad, Vivekanandan and Sonia. Joby had to overcome Sannidanandan and Somadas to achieve the star singer award. It would be interesting to note in this context that Joby had stated that Sannidanandan was his inspiration.

Now, as we move on to the question of sms many view it as something that sabotaged the result. Many online responses lament that Sreenath was `the real winner’. Some of the Dalit friends who attended the function told me that there had been tremendous support in the ground for Joby and that there was a common feeling that the `injustice’ done to Somdas and Sannidanandan should not repeat. They were determined to help Joby win. I feel that a sort of community mobilization has happened. During the previous seasons popularity was always presented as the other of good music. And the judges always begged the audiences to keep all other factors out and support only music. But now the most feared has happened. This may change in the next season. The return of Usha Uthup seems to be a sign.

This July 2nd we celebrated queer pride keralam and walked the streets of Thrissur with joyfulness. There were placards, balloons, rain bow flags, color masks, slogans; more over there was an enthusiasm among the community like never before. As Anil, a fellow activist put it “I am wearing a mask today. But I am no longer going to use this. I am throwing my mask away, and I hope you do too. Come out of your masks and come together”. This statement was reflected in the march though many in the LGBT community here still prefer to live in closet.

When I write this it brings back memories of Kerala. Manju and Ragini the two queer women, who had to end their lives because of constant pressure, stigma and physical violence for being queer. They had campaigned in their neighborhood, house to house, with a popular Malayalam magazine’s medical advice column that mentioned in passing that ‘homosexuality is okay’. They were desperately trying to have some ‘legitimate’ proof for their right to existence, they were showing that it is not only them but there are others, using such material from everyday life to campaign for their rights. Did they succeed? Yes, they did. Kerala’s queer community remembers them and is in the path of a struggle, a movement for no discrimination and rights to all. It is not without sacrifices that queer movement in Keralam has reached this juncture. People paid for being different and asserting the right to be different. Many become silent, many went abroad or to other Indian cities, many lead the double life of heterosexual marriage and denial.

In our correspondence in the early years of this decade, poet Jayan.K.C and I had often agreed that it would not be possible for a gay person to live out and be proud being gay in Keralam in the near future. Gladly, we have been proved wrong. People are living their lives with a determination that Keralam has not seen before.

New Democratic Movement, a progressive collective From Kerala proclaimed solidarity to the pride march. Panchami Dalit Women’s Collective and VIBGYOR film collective were the few other non community groups joined hands with the march. Today the queer community has started actively engaging in dialogue with the other new social movements in Kerala. ‘Queers of the world unite’, ‘from silence to celebration’, ‘if I am a queer, so what?’, ‘my mind is burning for equal rights’ the slogans echoed the aspirations of a community no longer asking for acceptance or tolerance, but demanding equal rights. Queer people in Kerala are not asking merely for acceptance any more. They are in the process of a change, of accepting what they are and what they want, making alliances, creating resources, learning and unlearning their own histories and other histories.

There had also been private gatherings of people who could not make it to the pride march. We have received phone calls from many in the community expressing their solidarity and congratulations with apologies for not being able to make it. It is understandable since the majority of queer people are living a double life and there is a resistance from some quarters against visibility. But the young generation is not ready to accept a second class citizenship. The post 377 situation in Keralam is witnessing these emerging unapologetic voices of difference. They echo that freedom is not far and away, but here and now.

In this section I propose to provide an analytic frame work that locates the phenomenon of state in a grid formed by the three major imperatives in the life-world of people: territory, project and mentality. Territory is the condition for the possession of natural resources. Projects cover both the production of resources for material life and the production of material life itself. Mentality refers to the whole of software (mental programming) which renders all projects and activities ensuing from them meaningful.

Territory

Control over territory is a pre-requisite for uninterrupted access to natural resources and making them available for projects. State is said to be partly identified in terms of territorial control made possible by brute force. There is no reason, other than the military power, for the continuous existence of marked territories all over the globe. This therefore also marks territorial control systems as distinct states. In other words, state as territorial control system legitimizes itself. The erasure of territories takes effect through the exercise of military power as the latter also affects the marking of territories. Territorial control is directed both outward and inward: outwardly, resisting the expansion of other territories in to one’s own; inwardly, defending the control of the territory against other internal contestants. That is, it tends to maintain the status quo, and military might is essential for this. If we are not already persuaded by a statist view, the states which have historically come down to us in that name, have autonomy with these features. It is a movement of power, human beings’ territorially warped interactive life generated, which they do not know how to get rid of; or it is a lingering historical habit that dies hard, until of course a transformative relation overcomes the resistance of the territorial imperative.

While the two-pronged territorial imperative continued to be decisive in the self-legitimization of state, history of modern nation-states witnessed a change in the equation between the territorial imperative and other imperatives of the life-world. First, state tended increasingly to identify itself with the society, in the sense that it started reflecting the mentality. Second, it began participating in the projects. It is this convergence of the imperatives, with the state as its face, which social sciences received as an un-thought category identified as state. State’s interest in the production of material resources and material life was betrayed when in the nineteenth century Europe it gradually yielded to the demand for non-intervention in the affairs of the market. A clear practical separation of economy and state coincided with the emergence of two separate disciplines of economics and political science. These two pairs legitimized each other. But state did not betray its interest in the projects. Its separation in terms of a laisez fair principle amounted to protectionism. Under its inward territorial control a market-centered production of material life got matured. My point is, where it is not explicitly expressed, the state as an un-refined territorial control remained latent in the projects carried out by human beings. Explicitly, it introduced, withdrew, and modified laws that affected the arrangements with in the social world. Implicitly or explicitly, the state seemed very close to the brute force rather than having been undergone refinement due to its upgrading to nation-state status. The point is, the social theory should recognize in state an hypertrophy of social distribution of power, which cannot be reduced to a concept of legitimized state-power anchored in the politics of nation-sate, democracy and representation. The persistence of the state with its two-pronged territorial control should not be treated as natural. Its misrecognition as natural is a consequence of the statist view in which nation is equal to society and society is equal to state.

Project

By project is meant broadly the production and reproduction of material life. The relationships people enter into in order to accomplish the projects implicate them in multifarious distribution of power. That is, the acquisition of natural resources, the production of goods, and the production of means of producing goods, all imply that human beings enter into different relations with each other. This will involve preventing (others from acquiring or taking possession of resources from oneself), trading (in which others’ being—their time and labor is exchanged for different forms of goods) and reproducing (i.e. the systematization of this relation). Preventing got to be socially sanctioned and legally entrenched for which both mentality and the inwardly directed territorial control are required. The modern nation-states have evolved elaborate preventive mechanisms which have made this relation appear natural. Without this, the acquisition or possession of natural resources and goods produced out of them would be defenseless and the relation precarious. This state support is not only non-natural and social, but also arbitrary, which derives its legitimacy in the final instance from the military force of the state. This applies to the systemic reproduction of the relations of power too. Trading is only a frame, with in which people do not just pledge their bodies to the complex network of the production of material life, but gives forth their whole being-in-time. But when this trading frame is warped on to the preventive power grid, along with the systemic reproduction of it, the production of material life for them becomes a perpetual mortgaging of their being. Recent trends show that it is not as much the production of material resources as the production of material life itself that occupies the center stage in the economy. Designing material life itself became a world-wide market. In other words, human beings’ being-in-the-world is designed; in that venture they have already mortgaged their being. With their bodies pledged and being designed externally, human beings find themselves in a situation in which their projects cannot retrieve their meaning. The point here again is that the state has assumed a power over the projects of the people in that its presence and interventions gave a specific direction to them. That is, it is not as a natural course of events that projects involve people in certain power relations. Therefore, the political, as in the case of territory, is not natural but arbitrary, here too.

Mentality

In no other aspects of social life is this arbitrariness evident as it is in the imperative of mentality. Most of us are familiar with a term that is used in connection with recent modern computing technology, i.e. software. Analogically, we can regard the human brain—the neural network—as hardware and speaking, thinking, reasoning, feeling etc. structured as software. If we extend the analogy to the realm of social existence, then social relations involving bodies, their actions, their spatio-temporal distributions, the tools they use etc. can form the hardware. Corresponding software in social existence is what I mean by mentality. It comprises or implies all the subtle as well as the gross programming required for social computing. This analogy works better, if we concede that mentality is a site of contested programming, i.e. there is no settled programs, rigorous recursive functions. On the contrary, there is an open possibility of programs diversifying themselves in to myriad evolving patterns. However, in actual social existence, only a finite set of programs gets implemented. In other words mentality is vague, complex and evolving, but actualized in terms of certain specific power relations. We can also imagine different genres of mentality, but all of which may be subjected to shifts and turns in their movements, in more or less similar ways. Mentality has both vertical and horizontal movements. Mentality as a whole moves, as in tectonic shifts, creating new genres, changing or destroying existing ones, in its movement.

My present purpose is not to provide a theory of mentality for an integrated social theory. The aim is to show how mentality, in coordination with other two imperatives, defines the character of the political in human social existence. We have noticed that the outward and inward movement of territorial control relies on brute force. But under nation-states, inward directed control now was transmogrified considerably. State is now seen as representing the people in the territory. Instead of controlling the people the state is now said to be under people’s control. That is, the internal control has been turned upside down. The prerequisite is that people become a nation. This, in other words, is to get people united in its mentality. What was involved in this transmogrification? The self-legitimacy of the territorial control is apparently replaced by a legitimating act of the people residing in that territory. Whether under monarchic, autocratic or democratic rule the governments of nation-states are supposed to reflect the will of the people. That is, the need of representation cuts across different types of state. In a democratic state this is difficult to achieve because of the bitter contestation for representation. But in all types of state legitimacy is to be obtained through representation. If king is a representative of god then the latter reflects the mentality of people. A nation-state is a specific version of the religious, when the government represents this religion and this religion reflects the mentality of the people. In other words, democracy is not a defining feature of representational politics of modern nation-states. However, the crucial point lies elsewhere. The state’s movement from the thin self-legitimation of territorial control to a legitimation from a source encompassing the whole nation is sufficient to transform the practice of governance. The inward gaze of the territorial imperative now fixes on the population. Control now does not disappear, only that it assumes a new significance in governance. The strategies of the state are to govern the mentality of the population in order to ensure the legitimacy of the government. Governmentality is now governing the mentality, through what Foucault called pastoral power and by brute force. Does this mean that the inward control directed at the internal contestants totally disappear? It has transferred to the sphere of mentality and assumed strategies that suite it, but without relinquishing the brute force. To obtain a mentality sufficient to ensure legitimation the government has to engage in producing and reproducing such mentality through a control of attitudes, thoughts, and values of the people. This is largely done by engaging actively in signification. Since culture is mentality, government becomes an active agent in the production of culture.

Just as territorial imperative and mentality are mutually implicated, mentality gets enmeshed with projects too. This is not done just by means of producing mentality conducive for social sanction of preventive mechanism (mentioned earlier) state indulges in. This is of course a nexus in which the three imperatives are mutually implicated. More importantly, the designing and producing material life required to generate new attitudes to life, creating new images of life that can become the mentality of the people. Since being of human is primarily interpretative and housed in semiosis this serves as the power grid on to which mentality is warped. That is, the evolving pattern enters into the depth of human’s being-in-the-world.

State and Representation Today

The economic geography of the globe is said to have undergone a transformation during the last decade, the cause of which can be primarily attributed to the emergence in to prominence of international organizations of finance and trade which accompanied the cross border movement of capital, labor and goods. Most significant and empirically confirmed phase of this change is the increasing acceptance of neo-liberal policy cutting across nation-states. Measures like privatization, cutting down of public expenditure, marketisation, labor flexibility, thinning down of public assets etc formed part of the neo-liberal policy. Nation-states which are supposed to be political communities with sovereignty in the sense that the policy decisions are not made under external pressure, are now said to be under pressure, or already conceded, to implementing policies that conform to neo-liberalism. This could be characterized as projects outgrowing territorial control. Although, projects had outgrown the territorial before, i.e. for over a hundred years or so in the past, giving rise to colonial control, it is in an environment in which the former colonies emerged as independent nation-states that this assumes significance. The inward territorial control under nation-state systems is now a government which is not regarded just a manager of the socio-economic life of the people it represents, but as a legitimate body for taking or implementing decisions in behalf of the people which will affect their life. What happened when projects outgrow this inward territorial control? Projects within a territory, as has been noticed earlier, have already been protected and promoted by the territorial control by way of preventive mechanism, and other interventional measures. When projects outgrow the territorial control, then the latter will naturally follow projects because of its protectionism. How? The policies conducive to this outgrowth should extend across the border. The corporations are not themselves policy-making bodies. They look up to the governments: pleading, persuading, threatening or negotiating through whatever means and however complex a manner. In other words, the projects have already claimed part of the identity of the territorial control or its nation-state version. Outgrowing projects inevitably implicate nation-states, therefore, in an agreement with other nation-states, on how the interests of the projects could be safe-guarded. It is an agreement because projects, at the global level needed the same protection abroad as it enjoyed at home. That the projects among themselves have unequal advantages is another story. The outward directed territorial control looked terribly stupid and irrelevant, when some prominent expressions of human projects have outgrown territorial imperative. Some studies show that this de-territorialization of some selected human projects are also accompanied by a global mentality. This is not surprising: since projects partly define the identity of nation-states, de-territorialization of projects is reaching out of nation-states towards forming one single state. Merging of territorial controls might be a possibility just as business merger is. But global mentality did not imply any thing resembling this. It involved human beings who take part in the production and consumption of material life across the border, thanks to the outgrowing project endeavors. This indicates a change in the mentality. Perceptions of certain elitist and younger generation describe the global mentality as it works today.

State as heir of or a form of survival of the territorial imperative is therefore not particularly affected by neo-liberal movement. It is an active participant in that movement. As for the nation-states there is the problem of governance of a population who do not directly, and a quite large number of them not even indirectly, take part in the de-territorializing movement of the new economy. But the government, which is the inward-directed territorial control in the nation-state context, by implementing neo-liberal policies, makes them pay for its own doing. That is, the bitter measures the government takes, directly or indirectly, affect the day to day projects of a large number of people. The dissent is anticipated. It is at this juncture that government exercises the control of mentality, i.e. indulges in governance proper. Agents who are actively engaged in the project endeavors with global consequence themselves either in coordination with government or independently take part in the production of mentality to this end. Television commercials and promotional culture in general send images of new styles of life which are meant to persuade and convert common people. Such efforts to produce mentality conducive to smoothly implementing, i.e. with out creating large scale dissent, may not always be successful, especially when the state concerned is a small player in the global game. Moreover, people do not normally trust their nation-state government. All governments, then, in order to neutralize the dissent, always needed a third power, a party, a community organization or leadership of a collective which could be mobilized to do this. A government does not directly represent the people; it does it through an organization which mediates between people and the government. It is through the existence of such non-governmental bodies that nation-states ensure their legitimation as a nation and feels the pulse of the mentality of the people from time to time. Looking at it from another angle, the inward directed territorial control derives the justification of this control from the unity of nation in the environment of modern nation-states. However, such unity derived from the organization of a socio-economic polity is insufficient for the stability of a government which had to adopt and implement policies that might lead to wide spread dissent among its people. Mentality as was said earlier is a contested realm. It is not just that there are so many players in the contest, but that reproduction of mentality is an extremely difficult thing in modern societies when coupled with the complexity of the non-linear relations among multiple layers of inputs and outputs. This renders any specific directionality of mentality almost impossible. The symbols and signs and their orderings, which can be both media and message at the same time, themselves have a tendency to drift. Therefore, in its horizontal and vertical movement, it tends to yield unpredictable self-styled copies by erasing the original or making it impossible to retrieve the original, thereby exposing it to manipulation. Thus, while it is true that mentality moves at long intervals in tectonic-like waves, it can also be subjected to short lived waves from time to time due to manipulations. Politicians intuit this possibility much better than intellectuals and they make use of this possibility. Government and politicians in consonance with all kinds of media can throw up issues continuously so that the policy oriented dissents or critical mentality can be perpetually displaced. This need not follow from a displacement strategy of the government; nor needs it to be deliberately brought about by the work of politicians. The homogeneity of selves can always be mobilized through some semiotic techniques. In the same population inhabit different, often mutually incompatible, homogeneous group of selves, resulting in a total chaos of selves. People are not divided into communities and classes. They are divided across communities and classes etc. in terms of tendencies to form heterogeneous colonies of selves. It will be presumptuous to characterize such homogeneous group mentality as identity. In fact, identity is a most unfortunate concept that entered the recent social theory. Identity is a symptom, in which people as a group claim to have self-sameness and politically make effort to realize it. But the fragmented homogeneities are to be strategically mobilized to obtain what is self-claimed as identities. The natural tendencies of these selves are to subside till some busy semiotic activities activate this into active mentality, so that it sends tectonic waves through the multilayered mentality. When governance fails to strike a balance, in its management of polity arrangement, i.e. of between the movement of projects and the day to day life of common people, it necessarily turns to the production of mentality. Repertoire of power constituting colonies of selves mediated by signs is always laid open vulnerably to any manipulation in polity life. Its rationality is neither liner nor rational.

Endorse this  citizen statement on UID by commenting here or sending a mail to anivar at movingrepublic.org

We, representatives of people’ movements, mass organizations, institutions and concerned individuals including all the undersigned strongly oppose the potential tracking and profiling based techno-governance tools such as the Unique Identification number (UID) by the Government of India and the manner in which legitimate democratic processes have been undermined through this.

The proposed UID project seems to be perched on an anti-people perspective and violates a number of basic rights guaranteed under Part III of the Constitution of India including Articles 14, 15, 17, 19 and 21 viz., the Rights to equality, dignity, privacy, expression and the right not to be discriminated against, The project seems to be aimed at profiling people by pooling in biometric and retinal data pertaining to an individual and could be potentially discriminatory in a country where caste identity is the most predominant socio-political marker. Further, it is a travesty on the dignity and privacy of individuals. At another level, given the fact that more than one third of our population live below the substantial level called “poverty line” and without literacy & numeracy, a large section of our population would find itself unable to handle this number in a meaningful way and thus face the danger of virtually stripped of their citizenship and thereby the very legitimacy of their existence on the land of this country.

This project which has been launched at a budgeted cost of INR 1900 Crores for the year 2010-2011 in a country where the Government has officially declared that 400 million of its citizens are living below poverty line is , thus an insult to the dignity of the Peoples of India. The project headed by a person of the rank of the Union Cabinet Minister, whose appointment was not transparent and a staff overhead of more than 100 is also working under the most non-transparent processes and we fear that the decisions are made and influenced by vested private and corporate interests who have had a record of anti-people and anti-democratic activities. There is no wide public discussion on the feasibility or desirability of the project.

It is in this context that we have serious objections to the way the decadal census process is being used to pitch the UID process and no discussion on this has happened in any of the democratic forums including the Parliament, which also transgresses n the right to dignity and privacy of individuals and their choice to opt out of the UID process. If the UID continues to be tagged with the Census process – we would also consider boycotting the same. It is a matter of great concern that the powers that be have deliberately kept silent on the inter linkage between the UID and current mode of census

In this situation it is not clear which decisions are being made by the private sector or by the elected representatives. There are proposals within this project that will result in changes to the PDS, food subsidy, MGNREGS etc are being put forward by the Planning commission and UIDAI. They suggest that instead of food grains, cash subsidies must be given to beneficiaries which can be encashed at public or private sector shops.

In the past the changes in policy were achieved through influence and lobbying, but now entrepreneurs have been appointed as non-politicians with cabinet rank. While the project was hailed as a “gamechanger” and a welfare measure, the public at large have expressed growing concerns about the UID and its implications for ordinary citizens. Many questions are being raised about the nature, status and aims of the scheme. Countries such as the UK, Australia and the USA have found similar measures unworkable due to the serious probability of abuse and the strong opposition of the public. There is a huge expenditure proposed for the UID. The UID would affect every citizen. We as groups and individuals feel the need to engage the larger public in an open discussion about the UID and its proposed scope, implementation, benefits and risks. We are also mobilising public opinion on issues and concerns about the UID.
We the undersigned demand that

• the UID project be scrapped with immediate effect
• all the transactions undertaken by the UIDAI project be scrutinized by an accountable public body from the democratic governance structure in a transparent manner taking into consideration the concerns of the all the peoples before venturing into the implementation stage
• the financial and technological implications and the costs incurred so far, including details of contracts entered into with respect to the UID project be made transparent
• the Census and UID project be forthwith de-linked

Endorsed by

Moving Republic, Bangalore
Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore
Citizens Action Forum, Bangalore
PUCL, Karnataka.
Slum Janandolana
Alternative Law Forum, Bangalore
Indian Social Action Forum (INSAF)
PEACE, New Delhi
Manthan Adhyayan Kendra, Badvani(MP)
South Indian Cell for Human Rights Education & Monitoring (SICHREM), bangalore
Posco Prathirodh Sangram Samithi, Orissa
Adivasi Mulvasi Astitva Raksha Manch, Jharkhand
Himalaya Niti Abhiyan, Himachal Pradesh
National Hawkers Federation
Kerala Swathanthra Matsya Thozhilali Federation (KSMTF)
Nagpur Municipal Corporation Employees Union
Nadi Ghati Morcha, Chhattisgarh
Peoples’ Solidarity Concerns- Bangalore
People’s Watch
ANHAD
Sudhanthra ( A Rehabilitation Centre for Victims of Domestic Violence and Torture’).
Janvikas, Orissa
Other Media Communications, Bangalore
Visual search, Bangalore
Theeradesa MahilaVedi, Kerala
National Coastal Women’s Movement, Chennai
Alliance of women’s right in Disaster(ANWORD), Chennai
Kerala Tourism watch
Dalit Women’s Forum, Andhra Pradesh
Centre for Education and Documentation, Mumbai
IPTA (Bihar)
EKTA (commitee for communal amity), Mumbai
EQATIONS, Bangalore
Openspace, Bangalore
Rajadhari Basti Uriyan Parishad, Orissa
Chhattisgarh Kisan Mazdoor Vikas Kendra
Asangatit karmakar Shramik Union, UP
Munsikhan Mawat vikas Community Foundation, Alwar, Rajasthan
Pondichery Slum Dwellers Federation
Himpravesh, solar, Himachal Pradesh
Chhattisgarh Action Reserch Team (CART), Raipur
ViBGYOR Film Collective, Kerala
Adivasi, Sarumgi Vikas Sangh, Gujarat
Samata, Orissa
Society for Culture & Development, Kerala
Youth Initiative for Leadership Training, Kerala
Patabhedam Magazine, Calicut, Kerala
Global Alternate Information Applications(GAIA), Thrissur, Kerala
Kabani – The Other Direction, Kerala
Pedestrian Pictures, Bangalore
Just Peace Foundation, Manipur
Concern, IISc, Bangalore
New Socialist Alternative, Karnataka
Infochange India
Privacy Network in Asia
Countercurrents.org
Deccan Development Society
Jananeethi, Thrissur
ANEEK monthly journal, West Bengal
Urban Research Centre, Bangalore.
MEDIA ACTION GROUP.

Individuals
Anivar Aravind
Vinay Byndoor,
Vinay Srinivasa
Bobby Kunju
Chittaranjan Singh (PUCL-UP)
Hiren Gandhi , Darsan, Ahamedabad
shabnam hasmi
Dr SINILAM , KSS, INSOCO, Kerala
Sakthiman Ghosh, Kolkotta
Raajen singh ,Social Activist, Mumbai
Sarasila Pradhan, Orissa
Animanand Ekka, Chhattisgarh
Surekha Kanwar, Chhattisgarh
Kumud Nandgave, Raipur, Chattisgarh
Sanjay Sachan, Laxmi Grameena Vikas Samsthan, UP
Azma Azis, UP
Jannu Anand , nagpur
Deen Dayal Vyas, Chethana Sansthan, Alwar, Rajasthan
Dharmapat Ranjit, Kandhamal, Orissa
Rajan, Indo Global Social Service Society, bangalore’
Subaih Dehariya, Villege Andol, Madhya Pradesh
Bhuvanlal Dehariya,Villege Andol,Madhya Pradesh
Ramsumes Pal, Madhya Pradesh
M. Latha Mageswari, Mahila Milan, Pondicheri
P. Satyakama , WORD, Puduchery
J.S Dhukhia, Solar, Himachal Prasesh
Bibin K R Rai , Officer, Urban Poverty IGSSS, New Delhi
Dr Mohan Sigh Panwar, Daliyon ka Daghiya , Uttarkhat
RP Sahi, Participatory Action Group, Lucknow
waheeda Rehman, Jan Swaraj Trust, Ahmedabad
Qureshi Mohd. Arif, Jan Swaraj Trust, Ahmedabad
Asha Makade, Chhattisgarh Action Reserch Team (CART), Raipur
Vijayakumar H Kulkarni, Karnataka
Deliakar, CNDP, New Delhi
Alok Mohanti , Orissa
Imran khan, Journalist, Indian Express
Indu Praksh Singh
Ruchi Gupta
Dr. T T Sreekumar, National University of Singapore
Anil Tharayath Varghese, Delhi
Sebin Abraham Jacob
Pushpa Achanta, Bangalore
Anand Bala, Banagalore
Mahtab Alam, Civil Rights’ Activist and Journalist
P K Sundaram, Ph.D. Researcher, JNU
Sravanthi Kollu, Bangalore.
Praveen Arimbrathodiyil, REDHAT, Pune
Javed Iqbal, Mumbai
Ashik S, Software Engineer, Thiruvananthapuram
John Samuel, Infochange News and Features
Anusha Hariharan,JNU, New Delhi
K. Rahul Sharma, TERI University, New Delhi
Smitha.Nair, JNU, Delhi
Anu Fern
Sadik P K
Jenny Rowena, Miranda House, Univ of Delhi
Gopal Krishna, ToxicsWatch Alliance, New Delhi
Nidhi Agarwal, Environment Research and Action Collective, Himachal Pradesh.
Deepa Vasudevan, Kerala
Neelan, chief executive Editor, amrita News , amrita T.V , Trivandrum, Kerala
R. Ramakumar, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai
Sukla Sen, Mumbai
Malish C M, IIT Delhi, New Delhi
J. T. D’souza , Mumbai
Vickram Crishna , Mumbai
Shazia Nigar, student, Delhi University.
S. Sanjeev, Thiruvananthapuram
Asit , New delhi
Uditi Sen, kolkata & London
Seema Duhan
Dhanraj Keezhara, bangalore
Ishteyaque
George Perin
Asoke P. Chattopadhyay
Gitanjali Priti Bhatia
Prayag Mehta
Jean Fouere, Ireland
jacob Lazer
S V RAJADURAI,Writer
Jenna Gunnell
Binu Karunakaran
Jinesh K J
Amjad Khan
K. Satchidanandan, poet, New Delhi
Riyaz Usman
Mirza A. Beg, Jaunpur India and Tuscaloosa, USA
Divya Sharma
Ravi Shukla
Vivek sundara
P Radhakrishnan
Mohamed Thalib H
Gulam Mitha
Aporup Acharya
Regina Lambert
Ahmed Sohaib
Abdul Basit
D.Leena, New Delhi
Rana Bose
P K Vijayan
Paco Rodriguez
Hassan Koya
Saswati Swetlena
Amitadyuti Kumar, President, Association for Protection of Democratic Rights (APDR) Hooghly District Committee
Harish Singh, Bangalore
Harjinder Singh (Laltu)
George Pulikuthiyil, Thrissur
Dr. B.C.Mehta
Syed Ali Mujtaba
Vilas Sukhadeve, Nagpur
Rahul Menon
Mushtaq Mohammed Khan
shaheen khan
Manoj Puravankara, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY, USA
Sandeep Singh, All india students Association (AISA)
Tanushree Gangopadhyay
Bhagwad Jal Park
Dilip Mandal
Karthik Ramanathan, University of Massachusetts Lowell
Ravi, Software Developer, New Delhi
Arunkumar K
Anil Ennakkad
Rita Manchanda, Safhr ( India)
KS Subramanian.
Joseph Chenakala, Social Activist, Belgaum
C.Raja
Chitra, PhD Scholar, TISS, Mumbai
Uma V Chandru, Bangalore
Vibha Iyer, Progressive Students’ Union
Prabhat Sharan
Renu Ramanath
B.R.P.Bhaskar
Dipankar Chakrabarti (Editor, ANEEK)
Debarshi Ray, Free Software Developer
Lalit Batra, City University of New York
Kalyani Menon-Sen, Gurgaon
Abhijit Menon Sen
Sushovan Dhar
Shalila Raj
Jamlan, Tamil Nadu
Janet Surman
Kumarathasan
K. Nagarajan
Arun M, Thiruvananthapuram
faisal khan, NAPM,Asha parivar
Dr. Manas Sardar, Materials Physics Division, Indira Gandhi Center for Atomic Reseach, Kalpakkam 603102
Kavita Krishnnan, AIPWA
Mohammad Askari
Aditya Sarkar
Suman Chakma
Jaspal Singh Sidhu
P K Vijayan
Arasu Balraj, Chennai.
Rohan DSouza

When we bought the tickets of LSD LSD (LOVE SEX and DHOKHA), at Regal theatre, our eyes fell on a couple, who were quite well immersed in one another in the public place. My friend asked me, “What is this happening?” I said, “LOVE”. She said, “Ummm (playful smile)… ready to move towards next step”. I replied jokingly, “After that Dhokha?” And then we giggled without having any idea that the same kind of scene we would be watching in the movie and it would be reinstating our position that we are viewers not just inside cinema hall but anywhere, anytime.

Finally, we were inside the hall and waiting for the film to begin. But! What’s this? Such an unconventional beginning, that neurons had to take their extra time to send back message – “What the optic lobes have just perceived is the beginning of the film and not an advertisement of a local video camera leasing company, which promises the best end results of the video cam”. This is for the first time supposedly in the history of mainstream Hindi cinema, that entire film is shot in a fashion as if the viewer is handling the camera and watching how do people move or behave before the camera lens. Camera Lens is here an extension of eye lens of spectator.

All the main actors have been cast for the first time and they are not more than characters. This is the beauty of direction. But what compelled Director Dibaker Banerjee to tell tales of not so successful Dilwale Dulhaniya Lejayenge type/Blue Film Market/ Sting Operation aka Tehelka in this manner? Many people can be seen drooling over stalls at every nook and corner of the main markets of our cities or railways stations or bus stands/stops, to buy CDs/DVDs/fictitious stories of what is called as reality bites. LSD has facilitated presentation of few of those tales burnt in CDs/DVDs onto celluloid.  The voyeuristic tendencies of the people coupled with advancement in visual technology seem to have interested Dibakar Banarjee.

All the three stories have a common meeting point i.e. a multi-purpose retail store and are shown to be shot from three different camera perspectives. At many times one gets the feel as if the camera is central character and everything changes or movie progresses with the positioning of the camera. In the first and last story for example one can sense the significant role played by the video camera, its movements, significance of jerks, blurred meaningless (but meaningful) frames and finally to get into the psyche of the characters.

First story is influenced by Yash Chopra’s films where Rahul or Raj are the male protagonists who fall in love with a pretty, innocent girl and then make efforts to woo her father to get consent for happy union of two. Here, Rahul falls for a girl who he directs for his project film. Before the love story could reach its pinnacle father of the girl tried to get her married, but she runs away. They marry in a temple, spend their time in a hotel where they shoot every moment of their life in camera. Father finally traces them out and assures to accept their relation if they would return. But in the disguise of that compromise approaches the end of their life and then this love story sells as one of the reality videos.  Dibakar crafted the plot in the shadow of contemporary social blot of honour killings which are still in practice in otherwise rich and modern provinces of Haryana and Punjab.

Dibaker Banerjee has reiterated the ambitions, paradoxes, confusions of the middle class vis-a-vis their Sexual life and Love, which is finding various kinds of expression in covert and overt manner. Covert, because, this same middle-class collectively wear mask of morality in the public spaces; emergence of moral policing is the outcome of the same mind-set. After media revolution, anyone anywhere could become the centre of news and in such an arena, many new age heroes-heroines emerged irrespective of their responsibility and credibility. Media revolution has awakened obsession of individuals to see them on camera. The latest in the fascination is to see sex life of people through various visual mediums such as CD/DVDs, internet, films, TV Channels including news channels and MMS. These voyeuristic tendencies have transcended gender precincts. It’s the matter of past when man only was considered to be voyeur who enjoys watching woman’s nude body and her in sexual act. Circulation of blue film CDs/DVDs/MMS clips among adolescent school students is a common practice, and the free access to video films of individuals having sexual intercourse on internet, suggests as if the entire populace is voyeuristic given comfort ability of space and time. Moreover, people are nauseatingly interested about sharing their sexual life with unknowns or known given a chance. Many deliberately take the chance by shooting their intimate moments in video camera and upload it on internet or sell it in the form of CDs/DVDs or send as MMS clips. This is considered to be an act of dare devilry. The other thought which works in the backdrop of mind is that it will instantly make you famous, and is also considered to be a shortcut to make easy money. How much sexual liberation society is going to achieve with these acts is yet to be assessed. It reminds me of a (in)famous Mysore Mallige which has formed inspiration of Dibakar’s second tale.

Dibakar’s third Tehelka tale pushes me to narrate a co-related incident that happened before me. I happened to meet a long time known who is correspondent of INDIA TV. He was sharing that how much keen he was on getting some CD/DVD related to sex scandal of a top politician. He was quite impressed with Swami Nityanand’s episode and the TRPs it has generated for the channel. In the last tale of LSD, these attitudes of media – sex and sensation have been re-emphasised.  Dependency of the NEWS channels on sting operations has less to do with politics and responsibility of bringing out truth but to attract maximum eyeballs and catering to the basic instincts of people to keep them glued to TV sets. This predilection for sting operations or eagerness to catch the sex life of people in visual mode has risen to such an extent that it can take fatal turns even. Like the very recent case of Prof. Siras of AMU, whose sexual life was allegedly shot visually by the AMU authorities as a part of intolerance for his sexual preferences. He was humiliated, sacked and it led to loss of his life.

Second story gets its skin through the standpoint of installed CCTV in a retail-store and subsequent use of those recorded stories of the CCTV to make instant money while the spy camera which is used for sting operations add nuance to the third story, adding importance to the blurs and not so focussed frames. Many critics may argue that it seemed more of an amateur video film rather than a full-fledged polished commercial film. However, in my opinion the script of the film and its spirit demanded it to be like, it is. Film in its premise is not a glossy or the one where the living characters are the cause of conflicts. But here the plot of the film itself is in conflict with itself. There is relative tension between the characters; their intriguing relation to the camera; their thoughts about themselves and also their relation with the viewer in the cinema hall, create variance in the plot of the film. And to add to the charm of the frames movie has been shot with video camera.

Well the movie leaves you in the whirlwind of many queries and answers such as, how can anyone consider oneself as sovereign citizen when CCTV cameras installed capture every activity and movement of everyone in all urban public spaces in the name of surveillance or security concerns? CCTVs are omnipresent and they have become part of our very existence willingly/unwillingly, consciously/unconsciously,democratically/undemocratically. How Middle class ever will resolve its confused state of mind regarding sexuality? Is Indian middle class ready to accept the fact there is urgent need to introduce sex-education in school syllabi?

His name figured in my cell phone as “Sarat Docu”.  I’m sure this was the case with many other pal mobiles across the sub-continent. He loved making, seeing and showing documentaries. He simply hated popular cinema. But destiny had in store for him a perfect Hollywood death; Falling off a moving train while trying to save a fellow traveler. God, being God, would have definitely known that this subject would not settle for an ordinary death. His second favorite was jeopardy. In fact this love for risks wholly complemented his life and films. How else could one throw away a cushy job in the Persian Gulf and roam around with a backpack – a compact video projector, screen, some tapes and accessories. In every screening centre something or the other will be lost. That must have been his next favorite, mislaying stuff; from tiny cables to huge automobiles! This time he has mislaid that disarming smile accompanied by the baritone greeting, irrecoverably. [C Saratchandran February 16, 1958 - April 1, 2010]

When the first Lok Sabha was constituted, there were 369 Brahmin members out of the total 540. But numbers of Brahmins have considerably reduced over a period and in the prevailing Lok Sabha, Brahmins are only 69.  The reduction of higher caste representatives in the Parliament and increase in the number of representatives of subaltern groups may be attributed to enhanced political awareness, participation in the democratic processes and successful political mobilization in the electoral politics. Building political conscious, electoral gains and ability to influence legislations are largely perceived to be threat not only to the long maintained political hegemony of the upper caste but also to the status quo. The increase in the political clout of BSP, SP, RJD is evident from the consolidation of the exploited sections of the society which is further reflected through their electoral gains.

It is against this social and political background that mainstream parties have come together to pass the Women’s reservation Bill. The representation of the women in the present form will be at the cost of the political aspiration of the SC/ ST and OBCs. It is insensitive towards the multifarious discriminations that women belonging to marginalized communities faces. It exhibits that how different political ideologies and parties complement each other in ensuring rights of the privileged and upper castes. The bill and the consequent political lobbying across parties and ideologies seem to be keener on arresting the political and social progress of subalterns than the meager representation of the women over the years in the parliament.

This is an alarming indication to the parties like BSP, SP and RJD who have been fighting for subaltern voices. It is a threat to their political emergence as it is likely to turn the clock back to higher parliamentary representation of Brahmins in 1951 constituent election. Bill in the present form would further strengthen the dynastical politics in India restricting opportunities to political families and it is most likely to bring in more elitist and urban biased representatives.

The discourse around the formation of Telengana state has been largely by opinions that try to quantify or assess what would be qualitatively good or bad for Telengana and its people specifically and for the Andhra Pradesh state generally. I really fail to understand this debate if one recognizes the right to self determination as a fait accompli. Insofar as the International Human Rights legal regime is concerned, this right occupies a pivotal place in both the primary documents that define this legal paradigm viz. International Covenant on Civil & Political Rights (ICCPR) & International Covenant on Economic. Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) Interestingly as the first legal formulation of both these covenants and worded alike:

Art1 ICCPR & ICESCR

“1. All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development.

2. All peoples may, for their own ends, freely dispose of their natural wealth and resources without prejudice to any obligations arising out of international economic co-operation, based upon the principle of mutual benefit, and international law. In no case may a people be deprived of its own means of subsistence.

3. The States Parties to the present Covenant, including those having responsibility for the administration of Non-Self-Governing and Trust Territories, shall promote the realization of the right of self-determination, and shall respect that right, in conformity with the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations. “

The special status (at least in theory) of this right has been reinforced by the International Court of Justice which propounds that this right is indisputably a norm of jus cogens -highest rules of international law that must be strictly obeyed at all times – and supports the vies that the principle of self-determination also has the legal status erga omnes – in other words, ergas omnes obligations of a State are owed to the international community as a whole: when a principle achieves the status of erga omnes the rest of the international community is under a mandatory duty to respect it in all circumstances in their relations with each other. But, I need to point out that most nations have paid scant regard to this principle in practice. The Union of India has been more forthright in this regard and has formally expressed its reservations on this right being included both in the ICCPR & ICESCR as pertaining only to self determination from “colonial” domination – whatever that may be – to quote;

“With reference to Article 1 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and Article 1 of the ICCPR, India declares that the words ‘right of self-determination’ appearing in this article apply only to the peoples under foreign domination and that these words do not apply to sovereign independent States or to a section of a people or nation which is the essence of national integrity”. The hypocrisy can be seen in the way that peoples will was considered w.r.t Hyderabad, but not Kashmir or NWFP (Of course the consolation prize was given to NWFP as a Bharat Ratna to Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan on his death bed)

It cannot be disputed that almost all modern international boundaries have been drawn with blood – more so the former colonies – and in that context – these movements for statehood, for me are symptoms of a maturing polity that is India – where people have demonstrably started to ask for divesting of power in their hands. The realpolitik of this might be tricky though – but why do we always assume that people cannot decide for themselves. It has to be borne in mind that these demands are being made with subtle and overt assertions of faith in the the Constitution of India amid within the framework of Union of India.

In the case of Telengana too – that is precisely what most of us are doing. The badness of the idea is attributed to a number of reasons that “experts” diagnose and give solutions to – but when it comes to the opinion of the people of Telengana – the onus is thrown on their inept and corrupt leaders. In that context, I do not think K. Chandrasekhar Rao /Telangana Rashtra Samiti would carry too much weight in that region. Despite his fast that was portrayed as the tilting point by English language media (and of course the absence of Y. S. Rajasekhara Reddy) – in the event of a new state of Telengana I doubt that his chief ministerial ambitions would materialise without the outside support.  My sense about the region is that people have already lost faith in him/party. And the rich social and cultural legacy that the struggle carries beyond political parties. In that sense, I was taken by surprise by the unilateral declaration of the Central government (unless there is a conspiracy theory given how flippant KCR is). I thought this would have been a creative moment to be captured by the Congress leadership and they could have experimented with many democratic options, including (am sure they do not have the courage) perhaps a referendum in the region and bought time to parley with their local leadership.

Insofar the arguments about the viability of small states vs large states are concerned – i think it is filled with an imperialist bias. History of modern nation states show us that smaller administrative units perform better in terms of quality of life for its citizens from Cuba to Netherlands, while most massive human rights abuses happen in large states with overt or covert imperial ambitions from the USA to the erstwhile USSR to our own country. The birth place of democracy according to mythology – Greece – it might do well for us to remember – comprised of city states (though most of them were not “democracies”) and ancient Greece still holds a primal place within liberal democratic lore!!

Just wanted to add one more point – linguistic boundaries in India have been as flippant and insensitive as most modern boundaries anywhere in the world. A good example would be Karnataka and the number of linguistic identities within the same state – Kannada, Kodava, Tulu, Konkani, Tamil, Marathi etc. and the rise of Kannada chauvinism (e.g – KRRS) needs also to be seen in that context. We could say the same about most boundaries of the so-called linguistically re-organised states where administrative convenience was always placed before peoples interests (North eastern states are the prime example and Verrier Elwin played no small role in that policy game)

My sincere hope is that many more celebrate this growing maturity within the Indian polity and join hands in evolving a creative solution to not only Telengana, but similar articulations, of course within the constraints of realpolitik – even if the Congress government has tied itself into a bind on this issue. I think Mayawati did play a masterstroke in supporting the call for division of the present UP – and was wishing that more political actors would take a cue from this!!!!

“Chithralekha is a symbol and sign of the marginalization that Dalits face in modern Kerala”, notes the solidarity mission in its report after visiting Payyanur to ascertain the facts about the hoodlums stigmatizing and victimizing Chitralekha. It is salutary that some of the civil society activists and groups in Keralam after some initial fabrication like “we versus aliens” came out actively in support of Chitralekha. The issue has also become a rallying point for the defunct civil society movement in Keralam to resuscitate itself from its visible departure in the wake of Chengara land struggle. The civil society movements in Keralam had its glorious time in the 1980s and 90s. Violations of rights were rampant even after the withdrawal of emergency. They were part of the Leviathan methods of State craft. The surplus value these violations generated were a boon to the media struggling to reclaim the credibility it had lost during emergency.

The nature of violations was such that the elite amongst the emergent middle class were quick in understanding that the extension of the violation may hinder their own private interests. There had been such a brahmanical excitement in the decades just after the British formally left India with the nation-building idea that the displacement of aboriginals and dalitbahujans in the name of mega projects were only sacrifices at altar of the emergent Nation-God. But the saga of nation building progressed in a way that road to its promised land had to necessarily eat into the holy terrains of middle class masses.

Civil society did not dither in properly apprehending the concerns of the middle classes that roundly made it. Ecology got its primacy since then. Meanwhile, the alienation of different classes from the “inliers” of nation-hood facilitated emergence of singular social groupings demanding particular benefits like fisher folk associations.  Nevertheless, the benefits were not like the rights demand as it always lacked assertions from the people.

1980s and 90s witnessed political salience of civil society groupings. Many of the groups have its legacy in the Naxalite movement of the previous decade. The individuals who had entrepreneurial acumen and negotiation skills transformed the groups aligned to them as distinct entities prioritizing and minimizing its concern to some basic issues that can rock into the core of urban middle class with political sensitivities.

The pitched battles it fought brought sufficient dividends for both civil society activists group as well as the State. A win-win for both! The ambivalent engagements of State and civil society activism was progressing with a mutuality sometimes co-engineered, some times aided by the judiciary, some times guaranteed by the media. But the days were numbering and its grind halted with the irruption of the march of Adivasis to the precious zone of the state capital in 2001.  The civil society sisterhood and brotherhood then split along several lines. The aboriginals lost the innocence the eco- mothers of Keralam had been celebrating for long.

During the time Congress-led UDF was in power and hence for the same reason, the forum had cause-sympathizers ranging from the primitive Left to past-modernizing Left. Past-modernizers, the real ex-centers dual aim was of sustaining one-self through the changing times by free- marketing seventies nostalgia concocted  with some secular free-riders and also act as double-agent for one of the “absent ruling class” when the Adivasi struggle was going on.

Now the waning of the civil society is more than visible. The Adivasi movement was the last-straw. New social shakers and movers emerging from the distant remote and disbanded territories led by un-recognizable faces absolutely drain the reserve energy for the enduring of the civil society groups. The emergent new movements prioritized a different set of issues. It subverted the older agenda of “unity and opposition” contracted between State and civil society groups.

Even while not receiving the due publicity, the new subjects did not demand any facilitation from the civil society gathering. On the contrary, it only offered its support to civil society actors to get in touch with the reality as evident in the locale of political action. Clueless about the turn history has taken, some activist and journalist-promoters of the civil society groups transformed their role from “activist” to “mediators” disrobing themselves from the previous avatar of “self-less” civil society service personnel.

Years later the Chengara land struggle diminished the valiant presence of old lords of civil society groups. The most visible aspect of the struggle was the new actors’ refusal to play victim. The patron–client relation that the civil society groups had with the strugglers broke since Chengara. The victim industry stock value dropped. The promoters were left in deep lurch after this great crash.

The Marxist party, as usual, had a different understanding about its relation vis-à-vis new political mobilizations. It did not share the “victim” industry evaluation of new political subjects. The Marxist party was intact in its primordial belief in “public sector monopoly”. It agitated against the idea of Dalits or Adivasis or Muslims organizing themselves for resource sharing. The belief of the Marxist party is firmly rooted in its understanding of new political subjects as ‘Amoral” agents of social change.

Marxist party permitted and entertained civil society “causes” in enabling appropriate technology solutions, ecological minimalism, some small little steps in anti-dam posturing etc. But when it came to greater causes like distribution of land, it was unrelenting in its opposition. The simple, parental, governmental ego of the Marxist party knows what “progressive” is and it could not even think of “Amoral” agents countering the party which had introduced land reforms for the first time in post-colonial Indian history.

Adivasis do not count as ‘victims” in Marxist party agenda since they could not even singularly constitute as active participants of change. Hence with a parental authority its magnificent “working class” or “de-classed” leaders will lead the tribal march to land occupied by private persons.

However, deeper is the problems of the conventional civil society operators. The civil society operands have met with severe challenges. Firstly devoid of a moral victim in pursuant of a justice facilitated by the civil society actors, it could not centre-stage its old agent-provocateur role. Secondly, despite its best efforts in aligning to new political subjects, the fifth estate actors were reduced to much diminishing role as the new agents have calibrated the movement on their own strength. Thirdly, the new political subjects have redrawn the contours of political society as new subjects subverted the old paradigm of civil society clientilism with an influx of new social energy.