This is the kind of injustice that Adivasis are facing today. Throughout the country Adivasis are being displaced or oppressed in the interests of furthering modern industrial development and if they protest then they are being killed and jailed after being implicated in false cases. Even if they somehow manage to get acquitted in the trial courts, the State perversely appeals against the acquittals in the higher courts where, due to the huge pendency of cases, final hearings do not take place and even motion hearings do not come up for proper hearing. Jagsingh happens to be one of the few who has a Sangathan to back him and so he is not having to pay the exorbitant fees of engaging senior lawyers and the cost of travel to the court but today there are thousands of other Adivasis in jails across this country unable to secure their freedom because of their poverty. What kind of independence day are we celebrating is the question.
A non Adivasi person's respectful celebration of the struggles of the Bhil indigenous people of India against the depredations of modern development - mostly exhilarating but sometimes depressing stories of a people who believe in drinking life to the leas.
Anarcho-environmentalism allegorised
The name Anaarkali in the present context has many meanings - Anaar symbolises the anarchism of the Bhils and kali which means flower bud in Hindi stands for their traditional environmentalism. Anaar in Hindi can also mean the fruit pomegranate which is said to be a panacea for many ills as in the Hindi idiom - "Ek anar sou bimar - One pomegranate for a hundred ill people"! - which describes a situation in which there is only one remedy available for giving to a hundred ill people and so the problem is who to give it to. Thus this name indicates that anarcho-environmentalism is the only cure for the many diseases of modern development! Similarly kali can also imply a budding anarcho-environmentalist movement. Finally according to a legend that is considered to be apocryphal by historians Anarkali was the lover of Prince Salim who was later to become the Mughal emperor Jehangir. Emperor Akbar did not approve of this romance of his son and ordered Anarkali to be bricked in alive into a wall in Lahore in Pakistan but she escaped. Allegorically this means that anarcho-environmentalists can succeed in bringing about the escape of humankind from the self-destructive love of modern development that it is enamoured of at the moment and they will do this by simultaneously supporting women's struggles for their rights.
Wednesday, August 15, 2018
Whither Independence for Adivasis
This is the kind of injustice that Adivasis are facing today. Throughout the country Adivasis are being displaced or oppressed in the interests of furthering modern industrial development and if they protest then they are being killed and jailed after being implicated in false cases. Even if they somehow manage to get acquitted in the trial courts, the State perversely appeals against the acquittals in the higher courts where, due to the huge pendency of cases, final hearings do not take place and even motion hearings do not come up for proper hearing. Jagsingh happens to be one of the few who has a Sangathan to back him and so he is not having to pay the exorbitant fees of engaging senior lawyers and the cost of travel to the court but today there are thousands of other Adivasis in jails across this country unable to secure their freedom because of their poverty. What kind of independence day are we celebrating is the question.
2 comments:
Lovely story... Propose to reblog in Counterview
That would be nice Rajiv as the plight of the Adivasis needs to be publicised more.
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