Category Archives: Government Oppression

Illam Thedi Kalvi will bridge the pandemic-induced learning gap in Tamil Nadu and improve learning outcomes

The recently launched educational programme of the Tamil Nadu government, Illam Thedi Kalvi (Education at the Doorsteps), triggered mixed reactions. The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) government launched this programme as it recognises the pandemic-induced gap in learning among schoolchildren. The lockdown disempowered children from the marginalised sections as they did not have access to technology-driven pedagogical methods as the privileged did. Many who find online teaching convenient and safe fail to recognise this class bias. The expensive nature of online teaching pushed a large number of underprivileged children out of the education system. The lockdown thus accentuated the asymmetrical structure of the school system.

Many incentives provided by the state, including free textbooks, free uniforms, free bicycles and nutritious mid-day meals, were unavailable to children of vulnerable sections during the lockdown. Their parents loss of livelihood compelled these children to drop out of school and resulted in increasing cases of child labour. This crisis steadily began to wreck a celebrated political value in Tamil Nadu and an enduring legacy of the Dravidian movement social justice. Launching this programme is the governments attempt to achieve social justice.

This policy will be implemented by volunteers first in 12 districts. It will be launched in other districts when the results from the 12 districts are positive. Some 68,000 of the 86,000 volunteers are women. This is quite encouraging as it could allay fears about the safety of female students and encourage them to participate in the programme. Otherwise, many may be compelled to become child labourers or domestic help. Allotting 200 crore for the programme is a welcome move especially since the Union government slashed the total education budget this year.

Though Tamil Nadu is among the most literate States, learning outcomes in have been a cause of concern. Nearly 59% of Class 5 students and 89% of Class 3 students were unable to read a Class 2-level textbook

in rural Tamil Nadu, according to the Annual Status of Educational Report (2018). Tamil Nadu got the lowest score among the southern States in learning outcomes and quality in the Performance Grading Index of the Union Education Ministry. Keeping these facts in mind, volunteers of this programme intend to improve learning outcomes. The idea is to do this outside school hours and away from the school premises in a comfortable and easily accessible location close to the childs home. The volunteers will teach an estimated 34.05 lakh children in the 5-13 age group in 93,000 neighbourhoods for 60 to 90 minutes between 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. Volunteers who have completed Class 12 will impart lessons for children of Classes 1-5 and graduates will teach children from Classes 6-8. They will refer to textbooks prepared by the State textbook council. Creative pedagogical initiatives including activity-based learning will ensure positive outcomes.

It is commendable that experienced teachers and civic and education department officials will be monitoring the progress of the students at the district and block levels. By providing a concrete role to school management committees and community development activists, the programme is turning learning into a social engagement. The fact that a volunteer who has completed Class 12 becomes an instructor will challenge the inherent power dynamics between teachers and students. When young volunteers impart lessons creatively in an unconventional atmosphere, the possibility of better learning outcomes is higher. This also gives children an opportunity to develop a critical understanding of their social reality. This will enhance their self-respect and help them probe the reasons for oppression and injustice. This programme is an example of Paulo Freires vision through conscientization.

Also read | Stalin allays apprehensions over Illam Thedi Kalvi

A few allies of the DMK say that there is a possibility of communal elements using the programme for their own interests. However, this well-thought-out programme will prevent regressive political elements from usurping it. But having said that, there should be strong and credible institutional mechanisms to prevent any violation of girl childrens dignity as classes are going to be conducted outside the school premises by volunteers whose antecedents are not fully known to the parents and children. Though the large participation of women volunteers will dispel this fear, critiques could use this point to dent the programmes success.

Puhazh Gandhi P. is Advocate and State Joint Secretary, NRI Wing, DMK, and Executive Coordinator, Dravidian Professionals Forum; R. Thirunavukkarasu teaches Sociology at the University of Hyderabad

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In pursuit of social justice - The Hindu

A NATIONAL awareness campaign of hidden disabilities and resources in schools is needed to reduce stigma and abuse, SNP members have said.

Delegates heard harrowing stories from disabled party members who set out why a campaign at the national level is needed to highlight that not all disabilities are visible.

Members debated how to raise awareness of hidden disabilities, to counteract abuse or challenges from the public over their perceived lack of disability.

The resolution called on the Scottish Government to raise awareness of hidden disabilities by promoting acceptance, understanding and comprehension of how these challenges and negative attitudes adversely affect people disabled people can live their lives without persecution and lack of awareness.

READ MORE:Nicola Sturgeon warns Omicron variant may delay second independence referendum

It also calls for resources to be produced for schools to educate young people and empower them to change attitudes across society.

Andy Stuart, of the disabled members group of the SNP, proposed the motion and told how he had been shouted at for parking in a disabled bay or using a disabled toilet more times than I care to count.

He added: The internationally used person in a wheelchair symbol for disability has become people's default setting for what a disability is, though some places are making efforts to change this.

In several cases. I have been so adversely affected by these attacks that I have abandoned what I planned for the day and went home because my anxiety levels were so high, where I remained for several days.

Stuart, above, told delegates about the abuse he has received using disabled parking bays

In some instances it has been so bad that it took an intervention by my family to get out of the house.

Stuart said that many of the great shifts in societal attitudes have come about by educating our young people present challenge their parents and grandparents.

He added that the resolution calls on the Scottish Government to produce resources to change attitudes to visible and hidden disabilities.

Alexandria Adamson, who suffers from cerebral palsy, depression, type two diabetes, sciatica and PTSD, said that passing the motion would transform the lives of people with hidden disabilities.

READ MORE:SNP MPs will bring vote of no confidence in Boris Johnson's government

She said that in the past decade her conditions have been growing more profound due to the alienating oppression, hostility, austerity and hateful practices and attitudes of Westminster control.

Stefan Hoggan-Radu, told delegates how he is a gay disabled man married to a Romanian and joked, I am a Torys worst nightmare.

He added: I know what it's like to be discriminated against because of a disability, having to jump through hoops to achieve the same as a non-disabled person.

Conference I 100% support that resolution because I believe we support everyone who has a disability, not just the ones who you can pick out of a lineup.

I was born with one hand and I also have ADHD, which is a hidden disability. My hand missing is obvious, my ADHD is not.

Does that mean one should be treated differently to the other? No.

The resolution passed overwhelmingly with 402 votes in favour and six against.

More:

SNP conference: Hidden disabilities awareness needed to 'stop abuse' - The National

A word that comes up often among the disaffected right these days is tyranny, defined as cruel and oppressive government or rule. Donald Trump, they say, hears of their oppression, believes them. Perhaps few others of political stature hear because their claim of tyranny is ludicrous.

The United States was born of patriots in an English colony rising up against taxation without representation. Recognizing that all men are created equal, with rights unalienable, those patriots overcame oppression and formed a new government, of the people, for the people, by the people, built on the proposition that all men are created equal.

A shining idea in theory but tarnished in practice. Our governments history of oppressing Native American and Blacks, for example, continues even today. If youre looking for true examples of tyranny, you need look no further. Yet the promise, the possibility, still shines.

When the Southern gentry cried tyranny! and seceded from the union in 1860, they sought not to end oppression, but its continuation. So today.

Theirs is the fear of losing privilege.

Most of those crying for liberty today have the vote, the ability to run for office of trust. The right to share their ideals and ideas and let the electorate render judgment at the ballot box.

But when they cant win an election, they attempt to change voting laws. Crying liberty! they seek to impose tyranny.

Mike Weland

Bonners Ferry

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Tyranny in pursuit of 'liberty' - The Spokesman-Review

It looks like serious pressure has to be exerted for the Kerala government to act against guilty and overbearing police officials.

It was only when protests nearly choked Aluva that Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan intervened and suspended Aluva station house officer and circle inspector Sudheer whose allegedly oppressive behaviour seems to have pushed a law student Mofiya Parveen to suicide.

Now it has come to light that even the High Court strictures were not enough for the government to initiate disciplinary action against police officials in another case. These policemen were accused of handcuffing a dalit man on the handrail of the Thenmala Police Station in Kollam district. The crime: The man asked for the copy of the complaint he had filed before the Police Complaints Authority.

In fact, the deputy superintendent of police, Kollam Rural, had filed a report saying that "at least two police officers had treated the petitioner with unimaginable barbarity - handcuffing him to the handrail of the police station and registering multiple cases against him." On October 5, the High Court observed with shock that no enquiry had been initiated against the two officials and they were still in service.

The Court then directed the State Police Chief (SPC) to file an affidavit explaining the action taken against the two police officers of Thenmala station.

Today, when the case was once again taken up, the High Court was told that the officers were suspended. Justice Devan Ramachandran was least impressed and asked the government pleader whether any criminal action had been initiated. To this, the government pleader, E C Bineesh, said no.

The single judge bench found this utterly disappointing. "Isn't handcuffing a man in a police station a criminal offence? Shouldn't a criminal case be registered against him," Justice Devan Ramachandran asked. "Why do you always restrict punishments to police officers with disciplinary action? What is the hesitation to take action against police officers? Police have to be protectors, they cannot be persecutors," he said.

The Justice also felt that swift and exemplary action could change the psychology of the police. "If the state takes swift and strict action against one police officer, just one is enough, the entire police force would change its attitude. Till then, this will continue; people will be chained, killed and even forced to commit suicide."

In the handcuffing case, the police officials had taken their vindictive action to absurd levels. After handcuffing the man, they also charged him with obstructing the police from discharging their duties. The High Court found this ridiculous. It orally observed that the odds of a common man standing in the way of police work inside a police station was highly improbable.

The Court then made an observation that included in its sweep what happened inside the Aluva Police Station where Mofiya Parveen was made to feel like the accused. "A police station is a public office, not a terror field. Any man, woman or child should feel free and confident to walk into a police station at any time," Justice Devan Ramachandran remarked.

Referring to the accumulating complaints of police high-handedness, the Justice said, almost in resignation: "God help our state."

The Justice also asked the government pleader to submit why the concerned officers were not slapped with criminal charges.

Follow this link:

'God help our state': HC on the growing instances of police oppression and Kerala government's inaction | Onmanorama - Onmanorama

The corrupting power of government is seldomly discussed in the context of public education.

At the heart of the ongoing hot debate over school choice is the question of how involved government should be in K-12 education. The data is clear that private schools provide a superior education to that of government-run schools. Education scholar James Tooley makes that case in Really Good Schools: Global Lessons for High-Caliber, Low-Cost Education. He argues that reducing the involvement of government in education can (1) reduce the size of government overall and hence the potential for corruption; and (2) reduce the potential for governments to use education as a means of domination, coercion, oppression, and patronage.

Corrupt Government Control

The corrupting power of government is an issue too seldomly discussed in the context of public education. The problem is this: A corrupt government will use its control of the education of its future adult citizens for its own political ends at the expense of the best interests of its people. Authoritarian or totalitarian countries come to mind e.g., the Soviet Union or China. But it can occur in a democracy as well where government power over schools allows them to control the content of the curriculum and thereby manipulate the beliefs of its future electorate. Tragically, Americas traditional public schools are increasingly moving in this direction teachers unions are working hand-in-hand with Democrat policymakers to use their unbridled power over schools to push radical agendas in classrooms, grooming children for left-wing loyalties.

At the core of this corruption is the intent to deprive the children of our nation of the education needed to develop critical thinking skills and the ability to evaluate facts and draw their own conclusions. Polarizing political agendas take priority over robust academic instruction. In essence, public schools have replaced teaching students how to think with teaching students what to think. As Tooley explains, Those with influence and power over education have interests different from the public good. Quickly vanishing are the days of civil discourse, balanced intellectual debate, and free speech and not just at higher education institutions but on K-12 campuses as well.

The corruption especially plays out in how U.S. history is presented. The 1619 Projects cynical and counter-factual narrative that slavery, rather than freedom, was the central motivating principle of the American Founding is being swiftly implemented in school curriculums. Anti-American ideologies are promoted, teaching children to have contempt for our nation and even its principles of liberty and justice. Based on doctrines of Critical Race Theory, students are labeled and divided into groups as oppressors and oppressed, not based on their actions and attitudes, but chiefly on their skin color. Academic standards are removed in the name of promoting a redefined equity, which replaces equal opportunity with demands for equal outcomes. Diversity and inclusion no longer mean respecting individuals and treating people fairly but stripping the rights and protections from the vast majority to cater to the demands for special privileges for select groups.

Education Emancipation

Look at history and even our present-day world, and a prevalent theme is that government control both stifles education and suppresses freedom. The remedy, as Tooley terms it, is education emancipation, with free-market education replacing government control of schools. And this free-market approach returns control to where it belongs parents.

As our public schools continue to teach radical ideologies while failing to educate over 70% of students with basic academic competencies, the urgency for education emancipation is dire. Private education is education by the people, for the people. We need that now more than ever.

Keri D. Ingraham is a fellow at Discovery Institute and director of the Institutes American Center for Transforming Education.

The rest is here:

Superior education with reduced government control - Galion Inquirer

Tech-enabled control of a persecuted population. Abusive facial recognition. Severe restrictions on movement.Branding peaceful dissent as terrorism.

For many readers, the scenario brings to mind Chinas mass human rights violations against millions of Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslim people. Yet this description would also apply to Israels treatment of millions of Palestinians living under occupation.

The Israeli military is reportedly using facial recognition to build a massive database of personal information on Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, which includes their photos, family histories and education, and assigns them a security rating. When soldiers, outfitted with an official smartphone Blue Wolf app, scan a Palestinians face, the app shows yellow, red or green to indicate whether the person should be detained or allowed to pass.

To one of us a researcher on China for Human Rights Watch the Israeli Blue Wolf system is eerily familiar. A similar mass surveillance system is in use by the Chinese authorities in Xinjiang, called Integrated Joint Operations Platform (IJOP), which acts as the brain behind various sensory systems throughout the region. IJOP is also a big data system, which detects abnormality as arbitrarily defined by the authorities.

People whose phones suddenly go offline or those who use too much electricity everyday, lawful behavior are automatically singled out by the IJOP for police interrogations and some of them are later detained for political education and imprisoned.

In recent years growing attention has been paid to Chinas use and export of mass surveillance. But Chinese companies are not alone. Surveillance technologies have proliferated globally in a legal and regulatory vacuum.

Governments have used the spyware, Pegasus, developed by the Israel-based company NSO Group, to hack devices in 45 countries, including those of journalists, dissidents and human rights activists. Pegasus turns an infected device into a portable surveillance tool by gaining access to the phones camera, microphone and text messages.

Earlier this month, Pegasus was discovered on the phones of six Palestinian human rights activists three of whom worked for civil society groups that Israel wrongfully designated as terrorist organizations in October, effectively outlawing them.In Xinjiang, too, the authorities justify their crimes against humanity against the regions minority residents as a strike hard campaign against terrorism.

In both Xinjiang and the Palestinian-Israeli context, surveillance fuels grave rights abuses by enabling the authorities to quickly identify and neutralize peaceful dissent, and to exert intrusive control over a broad population. The Xinjiang authorities would have found it hard to maintain their granular, round-the-clock control over all 12 million Uyghurs policing their thoughts, the way they dress, whom they associate with without the aid of surveillance technologies. Surveillance helps Israel, a self-declared Jewish state, maintain its domination over Palestinians, a component of its crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution.

In a recent article on the Blue Wolf app and the impact of surveillance, the Washington Post quoted a Palestinian living in the West Bank as saying: We no longer feel comfortable socializing because cameras are always filming us. This sentiment mirrors what a Turkic Muslim woman whom Human Rights Watch interviewed for a 2018 report said about the corrosive effect of ubiquitous surveillance: People didnt visit each other. If someone say, another old lady crosses the street to come to talk to me Id run away. The idea that this dystopian reality is taking hold among Palestinian communities is chilling.

International human rights laws require that governments collection, use and storage of personal data meet the standards of legality, proportionality and necessity. This means that there should be clear and public legal frameworks that would prevent a governments collection, analysis, use and storage of personal data from exceeding what is proportional to addressing an aim that is legitimate and that cannot be achieved by using less intrusive measures. Such a framework should also require surveillance to be subject to authorization and oversight by an independent body.

Governments should pass their own laws to assure that any surveillance they conduct will follow these standards. They should push for a global moratorium on the sale, export, transfer and use of surveillance technology until adequate human rights safeguards are in place. They should also penalize companies that sell these surveillance systems proven to have facilitated severe human rights abuses.

The US government has placed export controls on some Chinese surveillance companies, and recently, on the NSO Group. But such restrictions which cut off these companies access to US technology are insufficient as these companies are based outside of US jurisdiction.

It may be time for governments to step up their game, and start considering the use of stronger measures, such as US-style Magnitsky Act sanctions on human rights abusers.

While these measures will not end the persecution of millions of Palestinians and Uyghurs, they might alleviate the repression and just maybe create some momentum to end the crimes against humanity both populations face.

Follow this link:

Mass Surveillance Fuels Oppression of Uyghurs and Palestinians - Human Rights Watch

Key GOV Race issues:

Better than Jake Tappers State of the Union, Jeff Berkowitz and Terry Martin discuss the State of Illinois and the key IL 2022 gubernatorial election issues: soaring violent crime (especially in Chicago), skyrocketing IL property taxes, falling IL home property values, imploding IL public sector pensions (now a $110K liability for the average IL household) and IL teachers unions controlling education for their own purposes while ignoring IL parental preferences and input.

Worse, the public schools give students too much sex education especially for grade school- and too little effective education for the basics: reading, writing, mathematics and true civics- that most Americans hold dear (not the lies that Americas and ILs governments and judicial systems are currently dominated by pervasive systemic racism).

The Public Affairs episode, described above, airs:

This morning (Sunday) In Chicago, at 8:30 am on Cable Ch 19 (CAN TV) as the first 30 minute segment of the Illinois Channels two hour package (Opposite the 2nd half of Jake Tappers 8 am SOTU)

24/7, Watch the show by clicking here.

-This Monday and Wednesday in Highland Park, 8:30 , cable Ch. 19

******************

Berkowitz and Martin ask what has Governor Pritzker done about the above-referenced issues in three years and what have the four GOP Gov candidates proposed as solutions or antidotes to Pritzkers policies or failure to address those issues.

Is Pritzker proud of promoting Critical Race Theory as a major theme of IL Education and the idea that America, American Government and the IL Government always have and still do embody systemic racism?

Does Pritzkers IL State Board of Education indoctrinate teachers and students by issuing edicts about:

(1) what to think as opposed to helping teachers engage their students on How to think.

(2) the Illinois State Board of Education thesis that IL and the United States are dominated by systemic racism, white privilege and oppression of blacks and Latinos.?

Will Pritzker tout his systemic racism thesis as he runs for re-election? Will that propaganda play in Peoria and with ILs suburban moms?

How have GOP gubernatorial candidates Senator Darren Bailey, former Senator Paul Schimpf, businessman Gary Rabine and venture capitalist Jesse Sullivan reacted to Gov. Pritzker calling IL Government and the great majority of Illinoisans systemically racist?

ILs $530 billion public sector pension shortfall:

Also included in the show is a discussion and clips from a Wirepoints Facebook Live discussion (See summary here) of ILs $530 billion State and cities pension shortfall, which translates into an average pension liability of $110,000 per IL Household. Berkowitz asks is that huge pension liability for future IL taxpayers a barrier to IL attracting businesses and population from our competitor states, all of which have much lower pension liabilities.

Also included in the show are video clips of IL GOP Gov Candidates Bailey, Rabine, Schimpf and Sullivan commenting on the IL pension liability issue, as well as other important gubernatorial issues for the primary and general election.

Mayor Richard Irvin entering IL GOP GOV primary?

Finally, Berkowitz suggests that Richard Irvin, the African-American Mayor of ILs 2nd largest city, Aurora, may enter the GOP GOV race, and that could shake things up quite a bit, for the IL GOP GOV Primary on June 28, 2022 and possibly the IL Gubernatorial General Election in November, 2022.

Will Ken Griffin finance a $100 million GOV campaign of Mayor Richard Irvin? of any of the other current or potential GOP GOV candidates?

Filed under: Uncategorized

Tags: CAN TV, Essential racism, falling IL home values, Few CPS minority kids read at grade level, Gov Pritzker promotes critical race theory, IL teachers unions abuse of parents, IL teachers' unions prioritize critical race theory and sex education, Imploding IL public sector pensions, Jake Tapper, Jeff Berkowitz, Ken Griffin financing a $100 million IL GOP GOV Candidate campaign, Ken Griffin's net worth of $20 billion, minorities are the oppressed, Pritzker believes IL Government is systemically racist, Public Affairs TV with Jeff Berkowitz, Public Affairs with Jeff Berkowitz, skyrocketing IL Property Taxes, soaring violent crime in Chicage, Soaring violent crime in IL, State of IL Government, State of the Union, Terry Martin, White oppression of minorities

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Watch: will IL's soaring crime, taxes, public sector pension liabilities & abuse of parents by the IL State Board of Education and teachers'...

KARACHI: Prime Minister Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK), Sardar Abdul Qayyum Khan Niazi on Sunday urged the international community to take notice of the atrocities and suppression of the Indian occupation forces over the innocent people of Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJ&K) and other minority communities across India.

Muslims of India, particularly the people of IIOJ&K were living a miserable life under the oppressive and tyrannical rule of India and they were being subjected to vendetta of RSS and Modi government. Even the Kashmiris living on the Pakistani side of Line of Control (LoC) were not safe from the Indian atrocities as they were the target of Indian guns from across the LoC and their daily life was disrupted due to firing and shelling by the Indian forces, said the AJK PM while addressing a press conference at PTI leader Haleem Adil Shiekhs residence in Karachi.

Deputy Speaker AJK Assembly Chaudhry Riaz Gujjar, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister Mehmood Moulvi, MNA Jai Parkash, Members of Sindh Assembly Khurram Sher Zaman, Raja Azhar, Sead Afridi, Jamal Siddiqui, Rabistan Khan, Advisor to the Governor Sindh Ali Junejo and the PTI leaders and workers were present on the occasion.

The AJK PM paid homage to the people and leadership of Jammu and Kashmir who, despite the brutalities and carnage of the Indian barbaric forces, were determined and fighting on every front for their right to self-determination. I myself belong to a village situated near the LOC that incessantly receive bullets and shells fired from the other side, he said.

He said that the US, UK, European Union, United Nations, and the international human rights organizations had turned deaf ears to the hue and cry of the oppressed people of IIOJ&K and minorities of India. Even the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) had failed to sense the miseries of the people of occupied-Kashmir, Palestine, and Rohingya communities of Myanmar and did not play a proactive role in providing solace to the Muslims suffering atrocities and oppression, he added.

He said that he conveyed the same feelings to the visiting delegation of OIC and urged them to exercise their influence over the US, EU, and United Nations for protecting the minorities of India, particularly the people of IIOJ&K from the repression of brutal Indian forces and extremist RSS.

The AJK PM said that the minorities in Pakistan were enjoying equal rights and availing all the facilities like other citizens of the country as they have equal opportunities of participation in the political and social life as well as the economic activities.

He lauded Prime Minister Imran Khan for raising his voice for the people of IIOJ&K in the United Nations and announcing Rs500 billion packages for the development and promotion of tourism in Azad Jammu and Kashmir that would open the vistas of development and help uplift the standard of living in the valley. The work on different projects under the package has been initiated, he added. He criticised the previous AJK governments saying that the PMLNs AJK government left difficulties and created hurdles for the upcoming government. The PMLN recruited over five thousand people by violating the merit and regularised their services just four days before the expiry of their term by an act, he said, adding that the PTI government has enacted a law that entails regularisation of services with a test to ensure career opportunities on the basis of merit.

He said the PMLN cabinet throughout its five-year tenure consisted of 33 ministers but at the eleventh hour they restricted the cabinet size to 16 members, adding: People of Kashmir have rejected the PMLN as they only gained five seats in the previous elections. PTI has no issue to work with 16 ministers as they were determined to serve the masses by dealing with all the difficulties, he said.

Here is the original post:

AJK PM urges world to take notice of Indian atrocities in Kashmir - The News International

The Indian constitution is best seen as the social contract for a new India. It is the only document that was arrived at by intense debate, arguments and negotiations among all the political currents within the Constituent Assembly from members like K.M. Munshi, who clearly occupied the Hindu nationalist end of the spectrum, to the Muslim League, which occupied the other. Indeed, the position represented by Munshi was quite powerful in the Assembly. Therefore the final document that came to be adopted was something almost all political strands had committed to upholding.

It needs to be underlined that the mainstream nationalist struggle was only one of the many currents within the freedom struggle, where many other sections were fighting their own battles for liberation often from their native/local oppressors. There was the Dalit struggle for liberation from the yoke of caste oppression, the Adivasi struggles for self-assertion and innumerable struggles of the peasants and workers for a better deal and they often ran parallel to each other, occasionally intersecting, often colliding with the mainstream nationalist movement.

They came together for the first time in the Constituent Assembly, which in that sense, represented a break in the logic of the freedom struggle. The only political formation (as distinct from ideology) that was not represented in the Assembly was the one that had studiously stayed away from all these currents within the freedom struggle, the one that is associated with the current political dispensation and which has mounted continuous attacks on the constitution from the very moment of its adoption.

One line of attack against the constitution by this formation, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), which runs right up to the present, is that it is based on Western and foreign ideas and has no relation to our traditions. Leaders and pracharaks of the RSS have therefore always upheld the Manusmriti as our own indigenous code of law.

This charge needs to be answered at three levels. First, in the world of ideas, there have never been any borders and one need only look, for instance, at the history of the spread of Buddhism from India to East and Southeast Asia. Or take Christianity which travelled from Asia to the rest of the world, becoming a virtually European religion. Islam too, spread across continents. For ages, human beings have adopted ideas that suited their needs, regardless of their place of origin. This is something the Rigveda too acknowledges when it says, Aa no bhadrah kratvo yantu vishvatah (let noble thoughts come to me from all directions). The tradition certainly had a very different view of things than its current upholders and defenders.

Second, which are the foreign ideas that arouse the ire of the detractors of the constitution? From the periodic diatribes against it, one can isolate three ideas perceived as dangerous and western: the right to equality, the dignity and primacy of the individual as a legal entity, and freedom of expression and criticism.

To what extent are these ideas foreign? Some of these ideas are actually present in our tradition, if in embryonic form, especially in Buddhism. After all, the fact that Buddhism did not recognise caste differences and allowed women in the viharas, indicates a very different vision from that which upholds the Manusmriti and the varnashrama dharma. Buddhas call to be your own light (appa deepo bhava) is a call to each individual to be her own light and points to the significance of liberating oneself from the tutelage of others and to use ones own reason.

It was this that attracted B.R. Ambedkar to Buddhism and he, in a way, gives us a connecting link between it and the constitution, whose drafting committee he chaired. However, to anyone who has read V.D. Savarkar or M.S. Golwalkar and is familiar with the discourse of the Hindu right, it is no great news that Buddhism too was reviled and attacked for precisely these reasons.

Also read: Constitution Day: What Nine Pending Cases Say About the Rights Indias Citizens Enjoy

Third, therefore, we suspect, the problem is not with the supposedly foreign origin of these ideas but with the ideas themselves. We must then ask: who is afraid of these ideas? Why do ideas of equality, reason and freedom scare some people? The answer lies in the simple fact that these ideas rock the boat for the powerful and the dominant the castes and classes who rule. There is no way you can empower or liberate the oppressed without, at the same time, curtailing the power of the dominant; there is no way you can make people equal without knocking down the special privileges of the powerful.

That is why Golwalkar is at pains to explain in his Bunch of Thoughts that equality operates only at the level of Brahman the Supreme and not at the level of the jiva/atma or the particular forms of life where diversity (which means varna inequality to Golwalkar), is the rule. Here is Golwalkar himself:

Equality is applicable only on the plane of the Supreme Spirit. But on the physical plane the same Spirit manifests itself in a wondrous variety of diversities and disparities. (Bunch of Thoughts, 1966; emphasis added)

It is also important to recognise that the constitution, in focusing on the individual as the unit, also carries forward the established modern principle that the juridical person is responsible only for what s/he does. Like you cannot be punished for the crimes of someone who is related to you, you cannot also be punished for the crimes committed in the name of a community by some people in the community. This principle, along with the constitutional vision that would lay the foundations of a modern India, also put the country on a new course, setting aside its long history of strife. It was therefore, a forward-looking document that fundamentally sought to close the chapter of violent conflicts and the insistence of some people to continue to fight in the present, the ghosts of a five hundred year old past.

The continued attacks on the constitution and its subversion by the current regime that publicly stands for a majoritarian Hindu rashtra, and whose government has been characterised by systematic violence against religious minorities, Dalits, Adivasis and women, should tell us of the potential of this document to push this country in the opposite direction.

Aditya Nigam is a professor of political science at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies.

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Whos Afraid of the Indian Constitution? - The Wire

The torching of schools by students has become a regular occurrence in Kenya over the past two decades. The most infamous of these is the dormitory fire at a secondary school near Nairobi in which 67 students were killed 20 years ago. This year, another spate of dormitory and school building fires forced the government to close all primary and secondary schools for a few days.

Amid a wave of deadly school fires in 2017, the government-run National Crime Research Centre conducted a rapid assessment of arson in secondary schools. The centre outlined possible causes and strategies to address the problem. The causes listed included exam-related anxiety, schoolwork load, peer pressure, school leadership, and lack of guidance and counselling.

These explanations overlooked other important factors. These include deplorable conditions in many public schools, oppression of students and violation of their rights to humane treatment. A focus on external factors ignores the psychological impacts of institutionalisation and authoritarian governance.

There have been few academic studies of the Kenyan school protest phenomenon. A 2013 study concluded that violence was a means to self realisation that only served to perpetuate cycles of violence. Another in 2014 drew the conclusion that students have learned over the years that protest is the language that elicits response from authorities. Finally, a third study observed that school violence is the outcome of conflicts due to political and social differences that could be managed by peace education.

My own research found that student violence was a response to the devaluing and oppressive environment in boarding schools. We argue that school authorities could mitigate violent protests by providing formal political means of representation and democratic decision-making. They should create new spaces for negotiation and peaceful protest and listen to the voices of students.

Boarding schools in Kenya are closed off facilities where students live and learn for a period of nine months in a year. Historically, they were set up by colonial governments and Christian missionaries with the purpose of assimilating or civilising indigenous people. These schools were patterned on colonial models of education to produce needed skills and labour to serve the colonialist.

Today, there are three tiers of secondary boarding schools in Kenya national, county, and district. National schools are well equipped and attract the highest performing students and wealthy parents. The least endowed are the district schools.

Overall, parents prefer secondary boarding schools because they tend to have better facilities than day schools. Students have more time to focus on education, and parents leave teachers to discipline the children on their behalf. Other benefits of boarding schools include learning social skills, independence, and extracurricular activities. They also form part of government policy to bring children from different regions of Kenya to learn together and for economies of scale.

But these schools have retained their colonial hierarchical legacies of control, authoritarianism, violence, alienation, bureaucracy, and strict discipline. There is limited consideration for student needs, balance of power, technological advances, changes in the economic structure, and emerging progressive laws. They are what the American sociologist Erving Goffman called total institutions. Students are organised under strict rules and singular authority. Daily activities are carried out collectively on a rigid schedule of explicit order.

Punishments are severe and consequences predictable rebellion.

My co-researcher and I undertook a three-year project of gathering data about boarding schools in Kenya for the purpose of understanding the roots of persistent student protests and violence. The study focused on three boarding schools that had experienced protests and violence before and at the time of this study. One school served girls only, the other boys only and the third was a co-ed school.

Initial interviews with those who had experienced school protests or violence led to others who were approached to participate in the study. Respondents were teachers, school administrators, county officials, students, and members of the community. The research revealed that students experienced prison-like conditions in boarding schools. As a result of the dehumanising experiences at the hands of the school authorities, students vented their frustration through destructive behaviour, including violent protests.

Boarding school attendance is resilient in Kenya because of economy of scale, bureaucratic control and efficiency. The result is that the direct supervision of millions of children has been transferred from parents to educators who often know little about the students. Until they get to school, the children know little about boarding schools as there is no preparation for transition.

At any rate, nothing could prepare any student for the worst excesses of boarding school life in Kenya. A 2017 report described chilling accounts of bullying at the countrys top school. Students pulled out of a dormitory at night and frog marched while being beaten; students forced to wake up at night to clean toilets and classrooms while being whipped with belts and hockey sticks; younger boys missing meals due to inadequate cutlery and short mealtimes.

These experiences are forms of violence with varying intensities on their effects. However, society is more fixated on student violence than the autocratic nature of institutions and the oppressive structures which nurtured it. Until authorities shift focus to the deep negative experiences and anguish in boarding school, the burning is likely going to continue.

Students are political actors and conscientious beings with expectations and capacities to act. When dehumanised, students will act, react, or engage, sometimes with protest and intense violence. Kenyan students have learned that arson is effective as a tactic in protest politics. Some of the students we interviewed considered protests and violence as instruments of power to negotiate survival needs.

Although suggestions have been made to abolish Kenyan boarding schools, the problems plaguing the institutions are complex and systemic. Closing boarding schools is the path of least resistance by bureaucrats who avoid reform that would change balance of power. Boarding schools are not in themselves a problem, what happens in the schools are the problem and these can be changed.

Democratic space and public participation have expanded dramatically in Kenya in the last two decades. However, boarding schools have been left behind. There is minimal student participation or engagement in decisions that govern them. There is a strong case for school administrators providing formal political means of representation and democratic decision-making to mitigate conditions that lead to strife in boarding schools.

Literature indicates that successful schools embrace democratic principles of leadership, social justice, and community engagement. These would reduce the psychological injury and the pressure associated with total institutionalisation which offers escape through unrest, protest, and non-gratuitous violence.

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Acts of violence or a cry for help? What fuels Kenya's school fires - The Conversation CA