To my Indian critics, here are some facts.
India is quietly emerging as a new terror central, with disturbing new developments that continue to escape the glare of the American/British media. Neatly tucked under the well constructed and the expensive gloss of Incredible India advertisements on international television channels is the hottest Indian story these days but a fallacy. The fast rise of Indian religious terrorist organizations that have penetrated Indias military and politics. The movement is so strong, resourceful and organized that it warrants the label Indias Hindu al-Qaeda. In 1999, this Australian priest and his two underage kids were burned alive by Hindu terrorists in India.
The arrest last year of a serving Indian army colonel who along with some other officers has allegedly transferred military funds, material and training to terrorist groups is a matter that should not escape the attention of Indias neighbors, since it is directly linked to New Delhis new desire for expanding its reach beyond its borders and to serve as the regional policeman for American interests in the Asia-Pacific. There are reports now that the arrested Indian army colonel and some other officers linked to Hindu terror groups might have had something to do with the burning alive of tens of Pakistani tourists aboard the so-called friendship train service Samjhota Express in 2006.
One more reason to closely watch whats happening in India is that there is some evidence that parts of the Indian government are busy reading CIAs Latin America handbook of patronizing client militias and using them for strategic objectives. In Indias case, this means Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal, and most importantly Pakistan and China. This is the only major civilization in the region that never expanded beyond its natural borders. Thats why it is important to understand that the new rise of Hindu militancy has everything to do with Indias new interest in creating an image of a superpower. The worlds first religion-based genocide in the 21st century occurred in Indian State of Gujarat , where in 2002 more than 2,500 Indian Muslims were burned alive in riots by Hindu terror groups, according to a hearing conducted by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom on communal riots in India and the U.S. response, held on 10 June, 2002.
Since the start of this century, almost nine years ago, India has seen the targeted murder of over 600 Christians, most of them in riots this summer, not to mention the genocide of Indian Muslims. Hindu terror groups, like Shiv Sena, Bajrang Dal, and the Durga Vahini have established militant training camps across India where members are indoctrinated against other religions and Indian Hindu supremacy is emphasized. Recently, the Durga Vahini has proudly distributed pictures of its female members wearing the sari and brandishing guns at an indoctrination camp. In Kashmir, the Indian government and military are recruiting poor Hindu peasants into Hindu militias armed to confront Muslim majoritys demand for an end to Indian occupation.
The Indians have used this technique in Sri Lanka, where Indian money, weapons and indoctrination kept a civil war alive for decades. In China, the Indians are recruiting, training and arming Tibetan rebels fighting Beijing. And even American commentators are admitting now that India is involved in subversive and terror activities in Pakistan using contacts with old friends in the Karzai government. It is financing, training and arming insurgents and sending them across to Pakistan to carry out suicide bombings, kill innocent civilians in thousands and destroy Pakistan's infra-structure. But the problem with this genie that the Indian political and military establishments have apparently unleashed is that it is bound to feed on Indias massive poverty problem, especially in the next few years when Indias economy is projected to considerably slow down, starting next year, as a result of a global recession.
This religious extremist surge in India is also a matter of concern because Hindu organizations have found unexpected friends in Americas Christian right and the conservatives, who are using political connections to help Hindu Indian-American organizations insert activists in key positions in American government and media. The Israeli right has also established strong ties to the rightwing Hindu militants. Its all right for the Indians to think in terms of projecting power and adopt whatever means necessary to do it. The problem with this thinking is that expensive showoff space shuttles to Moon when almost no one else in the world is doing it for now, won't reduce poverty among the world's largest single concentration of poor people on earth.
Indians must look at it own depressing and callous state of affairs and stop meddling in Pakistan internal affairs. India must eradicate its wretched poverty and iniquitous and malicious Hindu Caste system to claim to be a democracy.
In the largest world democracy of India, 830 million out of its 1.10 billion population still live in abject poverty earning just 20 rupees (40 pence) despite 61 years of so called prestigious democracy. In the Indian Lok Sabas 543 seats: it is said that over 100 MPs' are billionaires; 180 million are multi-millionaires; 150 MPs are facing trials for murders, rapes, embezzlement and 2004 138 MPs were on trial. 22% of the world population live in India and 40% are down trodden untouchables who carry this stigma of Untouchables from birth to their death and until the end of this universe in the largest democracy. In India 20.7 million babies are born on average each year but over 3.5 million do not live to their next birthday because of mal-nourishment, food shortage, disease and despicable habitation. Economists blame this demographic division because 49% of the Indian children under the age of six are malnourished, as evident from their skinny limbs, pale faces, empty stares and the plight of the miserable environment in which they live and grow. In the last sixty one years of Indian history, over 50 millions embryos and females foetus have been aborted or killed and speaks for the fake and sordid democracy of India.
After 61 years of independence, India has achieved kuch nahi - nothing - for the 650 million Indian rural poor who live in abject poverty and cannot afford one meal a day, and are trapped in a miserable world without any prospects. They were poor 61 years ago and are even poorer now after 61 years despite India's rapid and steady economic growth of 8% for the last 10 years. Last year, the Asian Development Bank released a report confirming that despite the boom, the gap between the Indian rich and poor has widened beyond belief. One of the reasons for this gap is bad planning, failure to invest in health, education and social welfare, which has left hundreds of millions of poor Indians without any hope and dangerously low on survival prospects in their iniquitous society riddled with the Hindu caste system. The majority of these rural poor living in grinding poverty earn as little as 40 pence 80 US cents a day doing every menial job available when they migrate to towns and cities looking for work, and have to live in the worst slumps seen in the world. This poverty trap will never be broken in India as long as its poor are treated as untouchables and sub-humans.
As the Indian rich grow fatter and fatter at the expense of the poor, it is alarming many pundits that this inequality and disparity could easily backfire and jeopardize the Indian claim to be the largest democracy. Increasingly the rural poor are getting agitated, and in October 2007, 200,000 villagers from 25 villages across India marched to the capital to protest and demonstrate against their neglect by their corrupt government of the rich for the rich and democracy of the rich, for the rich and by the rich. One has only to look at the outskirts of Indian big cities to find abject poverty in which over 700 million poor people live. It is worst than the rats live and survive in the sewage drains. Indian democracy is a rich mans sick joke on a poor mans misery and wrethced existence and struggle for survival. In fact, the Indian. "Democracy is of the rich, for the rich and by the rich."
The Indian model of so called 'largest democracy' is also the biggest poverty ridden country in the world. In the USA, the senate and Congress have many members who protect the interests of mafia, arms manufacturers, oil moguls and financial crooks and fraudsters. In the UK, in the recent revelation of MPs dishonest and greedy expense claims reflected that they were and will always remain interested in their own wallets and pockets more than their constituents. As a matter of fact liberal democracy encourages crooks, criminals, fraudsters and greedy to flourish at the expense of millions of poor and deprived of a society. Democracy is not a solution to the miserable lives of billions of have nots and wretched poor but a continuation of a bigger misery under the so called respectable, democracy.
Indian farmers left without money due to failing crops, debt-ridden farmers in Bundelkhand, Uttar Pradesh, have reportedly been selling their wives to money lenders for Rs 4,000 - 12,000 (50-150). The more beautiful the woman, the higher the price that she fetches, it was claimed. The deals are allegedly being settled on a legal stamp paper under the heading "Vivaha Anubandh" meaning Marriage Contract. Once the new "husband" is tired of the woman, she is allegedly sold to another man. The National Commission for Women (NCW) is now sending a team to investigate the reports. Girija Vyas, chief of the NCW, said: "It is awful and unbelievable that it still happens in the country, and that too in Uttar Pradesh where the chief minister is a woman. "We are sending a team to find out the details and have asked for the report within 24 hours." She added that the commission had also written a letter to the state's chief minister. One of the victims said: "My husband sold me to another man for Rs 8,000 (100) only. My buyer took me to the court to make our wedding look legal. During the trip I got the chance to escape." In most cases, the women are illiterate and cannot read what is written in the "contract".
A farmer who helped expose the situation to the Indian media said he is now being harassed. "I was summoned to the police station and questioned," the man who is known only as Kalicharan said. "I told them I had spoken to the media because no one was listening to us. But they threatened me and said I was lying. My wife was also called to the police station." With reports suggesting that thousands of farmers in the region are involved, the situation has spiralled into a major political crisis. Opposition parties are blaming the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) government led by chief minister Mayawati for the problem. The state Congress president Rita Bahuguna Joshi said: "It is a painful situation. I am sending a team of Congress workers to help these women." A spokesman for leading opposition, the Bharatiya Janata Party, said: "Both the BSP-led state government and the Congress at the centre are responsible for this. "The centre has been talking of creating a separate authority for Bundelkhand while some factions want a state. Nobody is helping these farmers." :oops: :oops: :oops:
