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VICHARAMALA no.106
Sept 12, 2006
Thoughts on issues of current interest, including instances of some double standards of our public figures, especially in the construction of Hindustani identity (all those Macaulayan myths, and the hypocrisy that is Nehruvian secularism) - Krishen Kak
Our Nehruvian-secular UPA government is concerned about what it calls the "moral and financial" support to and amongst jihadi outfits (The Pioneer, Aug 17, 2006). V'mala 105 revealed one web of such "moral and financial" linkages connecting the jihadi Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) through the Consultative Committee of Indian Muslims in the US and Canada (CCIM) to the Indian Muslim Relief Committee of the Islamic Society of North America (IMRC), the Association of Indian Muslims of America (AIM), and then the Coalition Against Genocide (CAG) and the Indian Muslim Council (IMC) that is connected to the jihadi Lashkar-e-Toiba, to Pakistan's ISI - and to our very own Harsh Mander and Aruna Roy.
But it doesn't stop there.
Did you know that Harsh Mander is a fund-raiser for the IMRC?
Ah, but it is cleverly done. This IMRC for which he raises funds is "Indian Muslim Relief and Charities". No connection to the "Indian Muslim Relief Committee" of the jihadi links? You're wrong. Same organization, with the same American address, but it uses two different names. Why? Why sometimes should it call itself the Indian Muslim Relief Committee and why sometimes Indian Muslim Relief and Charities?
Consider the indisputable polymorphism of jihadi and jihad-linked individuals and organizations*, with Harsh Mander linking himself to one form, and now to another. One paid for him; he now raises money for the other. Ek haath se liya, dusre haath se diya.
Proof?
The IMRC announces its hosting on May 20, 2006, in the Illinois Frankfort Mosque (yes, in a mosque), of Mr Harsh Mander "to raise awareness in the Chicago community about the rights of street children and minorities in India. Mr. Harsh Mander will speak about his experiences and the challenges facing his legal justice project for the victims of the 2002 state government-sanctioned genocide in Gujarat and 'Every Child', his project to help street children."
The congregation in the mosque is invited to contribute "prayers...followed closely by financial donations", and "students, particularly, are invited to join Mr. Mandar(sic) and IMRC in their work across India".
The IMRC describes Mr Mander as "currently Country Director for 'Action Aid India'. He is also convener of Aman Biradari, a people's campaign for communal harmony and justice, founding member of Anhad, director of Center for Equity Studies, Delhi, visiting Professor at Jamia Millia University, Delhi, and columnist for Hindustan Times. He is a Director of Policy Research at the Center for Equity Studies and an advisor to the supreme court in 'Right To Food' case."
More proof?
For the previous evening, the same IMRC announces its hosting the same Mr Mander, again to solicit "prayers...followed closely by financial donations", but this time for "justice for the Gujarat victims" For this occasion, the IMRC says, "Meet Mr. Harsh Mander. The man who stood by his convictions. The man who resigned his comfortable post in the IAS in protest and decided to take the Indian government to task over the state-sanctioned Gujarat carnage in 2002. That murderous rampage has been billed by Indians of all backgrounds and religions as one of the most horrific events in the history of free India. Acts of rape and mutilation of even pregnant women and children became commonplace during the carnage. Today, it's been four long and gruelling years since Mr. Mandar began his work. He has raised funds and successfully petitioned the Indian government to re-open 2000 cases filed by victims of the pogrom. Yet, justice for the Gujarat victims is a far-fetched notion. Gujarat continues to be a powder-keg with victims still living in fear and, those who returned to the state, facing social and economic boycott. Mr. Mandar, in response, also formed the mostly volunteer-run NGO, Aman Biradari. This is a people's campaign for promoting communal harmony. It aspires to build local level institutions mainly of youth and women, of diverse faith, caste and gender, at village and district levels to strengthen mutual bonds of tolerance, fraternity, respect and peace between people of different backgrounds. It is intended to promote equal citizenship, justice, communal harmony, peace and the celebration of our social and cultural diversity. Amongst its many initiatives, volunteers are trained as paralegals to assist the victims of the Gujarat pogrom."
Ah, the wonderful Maulana Mander, a man of so many parts, a true Gandhian, actively promoting the Islamic goal for Hindustan, enthusiastically paid for and supported by foreign Islamic organizations with a trail that leads to Pakistan and its jihad against us, and equally enthusiastically raising funds for them.
And lying through his teeth all the while about himself and what really happened in Gujarat. Read carefully the recently-published Vigil book that exposes him. Read the two open letters sent to him, one of July 25, 2003, the second of Sept 11, 2006.**
Note that this man has never spoken a word against the Islamic State of Pakistan (nor any other Islamic State) but he publicly welcomed the end in Nepal of the world's last Hindu kingdom ( last para, http://www.openspaceindia.org/essays_41.htm).
The Koranic goal for Islam is a worldwide ummah. Its chief instrument, sanctioned by Allah himself, is jihad.
Sanjay "Munnabhai" Dutt, in reel life promoting Gandhian ahimsa, in real life was arrested for possessing an AK-47 rifle that was part of consignment meant for the 1993 Mumbai jihadi serial bomb blasts that killed over 250 Hindustanis. He faces prosecution under the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act. The murderous AK-47 is a favoured jihadi weapon.
Jihadis kill.
Now meet Harsh "Mandarbhai", another consummate performer who, while promoting Gandhian ahimsa through a facade of "prayers", raises money ("followed closely by financial donations") through a web of linkages of "moral and financial" support to jihadis.
Jihadis to kill us.
*For other pertinent instances of such polymorphs, see chs.4&5 of the Vigil book "NGOs, Activists & Foreign Funds: Anti-Nation Industry", available from its distributor, M/s Aditya Prakashan. Send a DD/banker's cheque or Delhi local cheque made out to "Aditya Prakashan" at 2/18 Ansari Road, Daryaganj, New Delhi 110002 (tel 2327-8034, email
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). It is Rs 500 per copy (incl p&h) for within India. For outside India, check with Aditya Prakashan.**
----- Original Message -----
From: Krishen Kak
To: +Harsh Mander ; +Harsh Mander
Cc: +Binu Samuel Thomas ; +Binu Samuel Thomas ; +ActionAid India ; +Aman Ekta Manch ; +Anhad ; +Barbara Harriss ; +Jean Dreze ; +MKSS ; +NCPRI
Sent: Friday, July 25, 2003 2:49 PM
Subject: An Open Letter to Mr Harsh Mander
AN OPEN LETTER TO MR HARSH MANDER (distinguished social activist and Rajiv Gandhi Sadbhavana Awardee)
Sir,
Your national and international credibility as a champion of Indian secularism and as a fighter against social injustice is derived from your oft-repeated and much-publicised claim of "resignation" from the IAS on moral grounds after the Gujarat communal violence. This act of yours had you hailed in the mainstream English-language "secular" media as "a man with a conscience". Subsequently, this writer discovered and revealed that you had, in fact, not resigned at all from the IAS and that you knew you were not telling the truth when you claimed to have done so. You had, in fact, applied for early retirement and you were, and are, aware that this is not a mere technical or semantic quibble. You know that a resignation, while crowning you with a halo, brings with it no direct material advantage, while a retirement fetches you upto a million rupees from the public exchequer. So you publicly gestured a grand sacrifice of resignation, but covertly you coolly calculated the cash inflow of retirement. That once this fact was made public you yourself ceased making the "resignation" claim confirms your own consciousness of your duplicity.
It has also been publicly established by this writer that you had communicated in ActionAid your decision in principle to quit the IAS at least two years before you actually claimed you'd left - and, therefore, as former AA senior executive Mr Binu Thomas and this writer have shown separately, your leaving the IAS really had its root not in any anguish over the Gujarat violence but in your cynically and cleverly timing it to secure the greatest advantage to yourself (retirement benefits from the IAS, continued lucrative employment with AA, fame and glory in the public eye).
A report has now surfaced that even your formal application to leave the IAS was, in fact, made before the Gujarat violence and, the violence occurring, you took advantage of it to make public presentations of moral heroism and a resignation on moral grounds.
The veracity or not of this report is of significant public interest and concern as directly and further affecting your credibility as a secularist, and the credibility of the social movements you lead and represent.
A number of persons (including Aruna Roy and Jean Dreze) on behalf of the National Campaign for People's Right to Information publicly proclaimed your integrity. You too are leader and spokesperson of the NCPRI and so the NCPRI was requested to make public the date of your first communication to any government or any other agency/authority in regard to your leaving the IAS, together with a copy of that communication.
Not surprisingly, and faithful to its double standards already exposed by this writer and Mr Binu Thomas, the NCPRI and those who wrote for you in its behalf, are silent.
You are invited to make public the date of your first communication to any government or any other agency/authority in regard to your formally leaving the IAS, together with a certified copy of that communication, as well as a certified copy of the government communication permitting you to leave including any attendant stipulations.
Please note that you were still in the IAS when you publicly declared that you were resigning from it on moral grounds. You yourself made this a matter of public relevance and concern. This is therefore neither a confidential matter nor an invasion of your privacy since it concerns the veracity of public claims made by you yourself as a public servant while still in public service. You continued with these public claims even after claiming you'd left the IAS and therefore this issue remains of public relevance.
As one in the vanguard of the public right to information movement, you must appreciate that you need to apply to yourself the same standard of transparency and public accountability that you demand of others.
Should this not be done within a week, this writer will consider himself free to act in regard to this report in such manner as he considers appropriate.
Thank you,
Krishen Kak
From: Krishen Kak
To: +Harsh Mander
Cc: $The Hindustan Times ;
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Sent: Monday, September 11, 2006 2:55 PM
Subject: An Open Letter to Mr Harsh Mander
An Open Letter to Mr Harsh Mander
Sept 11, 2006
Dear Mr Mander,
You are in the forefront of the Right to Information campaign and are on record as requiring "public accountability" from "funded NGOs" ("NGOs, Activists & Foreign Funds: Anti-Nation Industry", Chennai: Vigil Public Opinion Forum, 2006:143). You also continue to be in the forefront of the "secular" campaign for Muslim rights in Gujarat. The Deccan Chronicle today published an emotive response to the book, of which I am co-editor, and in the context of that book, the Chronicle article, and your own stated position regarding transparency and accountability, I invite you set the public record straight in regard to your public persona, especially -
Did you apply for retirement from the IAS or did you resign from it? On what date did you first write to the government in this regard? Did the government make any employment stipulations in regard to your retirement/resignation and have you honoured those stipulations? If retirement, what would have been your total entitlement of retirement benefits? If resignation, what would have been your total entitlement of resignation benefits? When is the date you were actually no longer on the IAS rolls?
What was your full entitlement of pay, allowances and benefits from ActionAid before you left the IAS? How much of this was in foreign currency? How much of this was directly or indirectly from any foreign source, and which ones? And, had you been receiving the IAS salary, how much would this have been on the day you left the IAS?
While you were formally associated (in any capacity) with ActionAid, to which recipients with whom you were also formally associated (in any capacity) did ActionAid extend support, whether in cash or kind? These include Anhad and any of the Amans (see p.136 of the Vigil book).
You have been described variously as "Director" or "Honorary Director" or "Director of Policy Research" of the Centre for Equity Studies (see p.142 of the Vigil book). What is the legal persona of this Centre? What is/has been your formal connection with this Centre, and from when? Has this Centre ever received foreign support, directly or indirectly, in cash or kind? How much or what, and from whom?
Foreign support in kind includes foreign-based sponsors taking care of your travel and hospitality expenses to, from and in the foreign country. Indirect foreign support includes an FCRA-organization receiving the money and then passing it on, whether or not in the guise of projects, to other organizations (an example is on p.128 of the Vigil book) so that the detailed expenditure account does not appear in the FCRA-organization's balance sheet but forms part of the accounts of the receiving organization or individual (see, for example, pp.122, 125 of the Vigil book).
These are all questions directly related to your public persona and to your credibility in public life. Some of these questions have been asked before, but not answered - you will find details in the Vigil book. The purpose of (1) is in regard to the veracity of your oft-repeated claim that you had resigned in anguish from the IAS; of (2) in regard to your primary loyalty to your British or to your Indian employer; of (3) and (4) to what extent "charity" money of ActionAid (and ActionAid technically is "a charity") was diverted by you to other organizations with which you were connected and that now support you professionally/financially.
The public debate on the Vigil book initiated by the Deccan Chronicle ( http://www.deccan.com/chennaichronicle/nation/Nationalnews.asp#Criticism%20doesn?t%20perturb%20NGOs,%20activists ) focuses on personalities rather than on the facts about them given in the book - for example, the Chronicle quotes Sandeep Pandey as saying that "as a principle we do not accept foreign funds", yet there is a whole chapter with details of foreign funding to ASHA that the Chronicle chooses to ignore. It claims that Ms Aruna Roy resigned from the National Advisory Council. She did not. Her term ended and she declined renewal/extension. Or, for that matter, the Indian Express lies that the book was "launched at the BJP headquarters" (Sept 10, 2006). And Seema Mustafa and Venkatesh Kesari, in the context of the book release, continue to lie about the number of Gujarat dead (Asian Age, Sept 9, 2006), notwithstanding the real figure released by the UPA government itself (see p.133 of the Vigil book).
The Vigil book is clear, as were Shri George Fernandes and Shri Narendra Modi who formally released it, that the crucial issue is not about personalities in their personal capacity, but of their accountability and the accountability of foreign-funded NGOs in public life.
On behalf of my fellow-editor and myself, we await eagerly your factual response to the questions above and in the book.
Thank you,
Krishen Kak
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