From  Daily Star, January 7, 2014

Beyond the Farcical Elections: The Black Swans of Bangladesh

Taj Hashmi*

The late National Professor Abdur Razzaque once told us in late 1970s in his atypical style: “Shara jibon political science poira ahono Bangladesher politics ki zinish, eida buzte parlam na!” [“After studying political science for so many years, I am still unable to understand what Bangladesh politics is all about”]. Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s bestseller, The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable (2007), might explain the enigma of Bangladesh politics, and most importantly, what the country is going to face in the coming years beyond the 5th January’s “Parliamentary Elections”, which experts and observers have classified as voter-less and rigged.

Only die-hard Awami League supporters and beneficiaries, and dull and dim people think Bangladesh has just crossed another milestone by holding the farcical polls to uphold democracy, and to “save the country” from “Islamist extremism” and “anti-Bangladesh” elements. Fareed Zakaria thinks that illiberal societies cannot run liberal democracy; they only run “illiberal democracies” despite all the fanfares of elections. However, as we cannot wait for an indefinite period for the transformation of the “illiberal” societies into the “liberal” ones to start democratic process, Bangladesh possibly came up with a unique solution to hold fair and acceptable elections under Neutral Caretaker Government in 1996.

The Hasina Government, for known reasons but no justifications (other than the ridiculous and laughable assertion that Caretaker Governments pave the way for military takeover) arbitrarily scrapped the provision for the Caretaker Government in the Constitution in 2011 through a compliant judiciary and parliament. In the backdrop of these flawed elections, now we realize that the Caretaker Government was done away with to perpetuate the “Awami Dynastic Democracy” to the detriment of the rival “BNP Dynasty”. And we know dynasties are not about democracy and human rights; they are all about self-glorification and plunder.

Most Western countries refused to send poll-observers to Bangladesh to rebuff the Hasina government’s obstinacy to hold one-party elections. Since January 2013 more than 500 people got killed at the hands of law-enforcers and political rivals. Twenty-two people got killed on the poll day alone.

The New York Times considers the polls “a bizarre election” due to the lack of competition, and that less than 25 per cent people voted this time against 87 per cent in the previous elections held in 2009. Aljazeera reveals that more than 200 poling stations were set on fire. We learn from the AFP that there were no queues to vote, and that only one person cast his vote in three hours at one poling centre. Interestingly, even the compliant Chief Election Commissioner admits the voter turn out was very low due to the stubborn resistance from the opposition parties. While 153 ruling party candidates were “elected” uncontested before the polls, the flawed polls have guaranteed more than two-third majority to the ruling coterie.

Now, are the ongoing political crises, social unrest, economic down turn, and growing violence – terrorism and state-sponsored killing through death squads – going to usher in the Black Swan era in Bangladesh? “Black Swan”, a common Western expression since the 16th century, denotes a non-existing object or what was considered “non-existing”. All swans must be white became a false premise after the discovery of the black swan in Australia.

The Black Swan syndrome is also about the catastrophic impact of the “highly improbable” phenomenon on society. Bangladesh has already gone through its Black Swan moments in the past. Its liberation in the wake of a short civil-cum-liberation war signalled its first Black Swan moment, followed by other such moments after the killings of Mujib and Zia, and the two military takeovers in 1982 and 2007. Other Black Swan moments for Bangladesh came with the arrests and trial of “war criminals”(one of them has already been executed); the controversial scrapping of the provision of the Caretaker Government; and the holding of the flawed one-party elections.

The collective impact of these Black Swan Moments of our history is going to bring about the Black Swan Era of Bangladesh, which is likely to draw the country into a long-drawn civil war for decades, very similar to Iraq, Afghanistan and what Sri Lanka went through in the recent past for twenty-six years. Unless the Government annuls the results of the so-called elections; restores the provision of the Caretaker Government in the Constitution; releases all political detainees; stops judicial murder through compliant judiciary; and last but not least, disbands death squads by the RAB, police and party cadres to destroy political rivals and to smear their image, Bangladesh is not going to remain a functional democracy, even in the most limited sense of the expression.

The constant cry wolf by the ruling coterie, “Islamists are coming”, is likely to backfire. Closing all democratic outlets to force Islam-oriented people and political rivals to adopt terrorist means is reckless. Sooner the ruling elites realize it, the better. The over-polarized and fractious Bangladesh polity is as unpredictable as a not-so-dormant volcano, which has been erupting on an irregular basis since 1971. As the Black Swan of 1971 was unpredictable, so is the one looming in the corner.

As large-scale pre-poll violent attacks on rival party members, minorities and innocent civilians (many mercilessly burnt alive) indicated that Bangladesh was not at peace with itself, the post-poll attacks on political rivals and hapless non-Muslim communities indicate that the country is on the verge of an all-out civil war, nobody has witnessed after 1971. The organized, frequent and growing spate of political and communal violence indicates that the Bangladesh polity no longer lives in, what Nassim Taleb calls, Mediocristan, but has already moved to Extremistan. While the Black Swans of Mediocristan show up infrequently, and are not that vile and vicious, Extremistan experiences nasty and brutal Black Swans, more frequently.

* Dr Taj Hashmi teaches security studies at Austin Peay State University in Tennessee. He has published four books and Sage is publishing his Global Jihad and America: The Hundred-Year-War beyond Iraq and Afghanistan, in February 2014.

From Kafila, January 3, 2014

Independent inquiry into Muzaffarnagar ‘Riots’: Mohan Rao, Ish Mishra, Pragya Singh, Vikas Bajpai

by Nivedita Melon

Press Statement on the Report  prepared by Mohan Rao, Ish Mishra, Pragya Singh and Vikas Bajpai

December 30, 2013

A team of independent academics and a journalist carried out an inquiry into the communal violence that shook Muzaffarnagar district in UP this past September. The report is based on the findings of the team during its visit to Muzaffarnagar district on the 9th and the 10th of November and again on the 27th November. The members of the team were:

Dr. Mohan Rao, Faculty, Centre for Social Medicine and Community Health, JNU.

Mr Ish Misra, Faculty, Department of Political Science, Hindu College, Delhi University.

Ms.Pragya Singh, Journalist, Outlook, and

Dr. Vikas Bajpai, Ph.D. Scholar, Centre for Social Medicine and Community Health, JNU.

The team also drew upon the assistance of Dr. Subhash Tyagi, Professor of Geography, Machra College, Meerut, and Praveen Raj Tyagi, Principal Greenland Public School, Duhai, Ghaziabad, in the collection of some data and the conduct of the visit.

OBJECTIVES OF OUR ENQUIRY:

. To investigate the role of state agencies in either preventing or containing violence, in taking appropriate punitive actions against the guilty and also to investigate some incidents of communal violence.

. To investigate the role of the government in providing relief and rehabilitating the displaced and the progress made in displaced people going back to their villages and homes.

. To understand economic, social and political reasons that led to the recent spate of communal violence in this area of Western Uttar Pradesh.

SALIENT FINDINGS:

Role of the agencies of the State

The fact that India is Constitutionally mandated as ‘Secular’ State makes it obligatory on the agencies of the State to uphold secular values. However, the communal incidents in Muzaffarnagar, its aftermath and the continuing tragedy of the riot affected persons have been the undoing of the Indian State in this regard. Regrettably, this has been the outcome of deliberate and calculated decisions at different levels as is evident from the findngs:

The affidavits riot victims were made to sign for availing monetary compensation

The Uttar Pradesh (UP) government has made the riot affected Muslim families in relief camps to sign an affidavit (copy attached as annexure) that enforced following conditions on the signatories in order to avail of financial relief:

“That myself and members of my family have come leaving our village and home being terrorized due to violent incidents in ……… village and we will not now return to our original village and home under any circumstances”.

“That the lumpsum financial help being given for my family by the government will only be used by me to rehabilitate my family. By this money I will live with my family voluntarily arranging for residence at appropriate place elsewhere”.

“That in the condition of receiving lumpsum financial help amount, myself or members of my family will not demand compensation relating to any damage to any immovable property in my village or elsewhere”.

The State thus sought to impose a demographic change in the riot affect villages through a legal instrument. The monetary relief being disbursed was not to rebuild the damaged property or lost means of livelihood. This has served to reinforce the terror of communal violence in the minds of affected families besides driving a schism in the composite culture of the area which mars the possibilities of gradual healing. Muslims are now being ghettoized in towns and localities dominated by them.

These aspects were pointed out by the team members to the district administration, The officials however denied that the government was preventing people from going back to the villages and told of an order stating that those who wanted to return to their villages were free to do so. But a copy of the said order could not be provided by the administration.

Nepotism, complicity and inaction of the police in incidents of violence

The shallow credibility of the law and order machinery in Muzaffarnagar is best reflected in the statement of senior police officials that – “both the Jats and the Muslims are complaining against us, so the police must have done something good.” Police itself is at pain to enumerate pro-active and positive actions taken by them against the wrong doers. Establishing credibility in the eyes of minorities becomes all the more difficult when in a region with around 27 percent Muslim population, as per senior police official of the district, the representation of Muslims in police force is less than 3 percent. The officer however maintained that “this did not matter for a policeman is a policeman and religion was not a factor in discharge of his duties.”

The residents at the camps however said that they did not want to go back to their villages as their tormentors were still roaming free and that the government had done little that would have them repose their faith in the law and order machinery. The frequent transfers of the senior police officials in the district have not helped matters either. In 2013 the SSP of the district has been changed five times.

In Qutba village, where from single largest number of Muslim killings has been reported (8 Muslim were killed) a picket of PAC (provincial armed police) was posted in the village at the time of riots. These policemen were having tea in the Pradhan’s house when mobs started rampaging Muslim households. The three Muslim men who rushed to seek their help were said to have been locked up by these policemen in the Pradhan’s house.

The second incident of killings that took place with the police in vicinity was at the Mohammepur Raisingh village on October 30. Three Muslim youth from the neighboring Hussainpur village were abducted from the fields and killed by the Jats even as a picket of the state police was posted in the village. The Hussainpur villagers on learning of the abduction of youth repeatedly rang the SHO of Bhaura Kalan police station, but their calls went unanswered. It was told that the SHO had switched off his phone.

Pradhan of Hussainpur village later told that despite their best efforts many of those accused by name in the killings have still not been arrested and are roaming free in Mohammedpur Raisingh. He further alleged that the police has “declared rates” (of bribe) to weaken the cases against the accused or even let them go scot free.

It appears from the sequence and the circumstances of the incidents of violence in Muzaffarnagar that had the police and the district administration acted with alacrity and a fair sense of judgment in the immediate aftermath of the incidence of alleged “eve teasing” and related murders in Kawal village, the subsequent turn of events could have been entirely avoided.

Outsourcing of relief to the Muslim communal organizations by the State

It would have been best if the State machinery was seen by the riot affected Muslims as a dependable, sincere and caring source of succor and a guarantor of their safety. The State instead chose to outsource relief measures to Muslim communal organizations, principally the Jamiat-Ulema e Hind of Deoband though some other NGOs were also involved.

On being quizzed – why no state agency has a visible presence at the relief camps, the district administration told us that this was in accordance with the policy of the state government. The Shiv Pal Singh Yadav committee set up by the state government post riots had recommended that all relief be provided through community organizations.

This reflects redoubtable wisdom. Communal community organizations cannot be expected to be credible foot soldiers for Secular ideals. The impact of this was evident in the camps. Apart from apprehensions regarding security upon return to their villages, the people also said that they would prefer to live “amidst the security of their own people.”

Different reports before ours have graphically highlighted the pitiable conditions at the camps. We would only reiterate that even the least courtesies like essential medical or civil amenities such as drinking water or functioning toilets have not been provided to the people in the camps despite visits by the mightiest VIPs in the country.

Jamiat dominated committees appeared to tightly control what the people said of the arrangements at the camps. At the Bassi Kalan camp when the residents complained against the government, members of the managing committee tried to stop them. Likewise at camp no 1 at Shahpur a local Maulvi expressed his displeasure when the residents complained of the conditions. We were told by families in the relief camps that up to Rs 20,000 had been taken from them by functionaries of the Jamiat for constructing alternative accommodation.

A close confidant of ours asked the leader of the Jamiat as to why they were not opposing the affidavits that displaced Muslim families were being made to sign. Reply was – “there is nothing to worry about this and that all of them will finally be allowed to return to their villages.” Jamiat further claimed credit for getting handsome relief package for the displaced families. Silence of the Jamiat over the claims of the Samajwadi Party leadership that the Muslims in the camps were agents of the Congress and the BJP is equally deafening.

THE WAY FORWARD

Despite the constitutional and formal averments of the ‘secular’ character of the Indian state, the de facto reality remains that the state machinery has acted in a highly communal manner which undermines India’s secular credentials. Even as the communal poison being spread by the Hindutva forces need be countered with full force, the role played by the Samajwadi Party government in UP in connivance with the Muslim communal forces and the latest act of forcibly evicting the riot displaced families from relief camps brings into question the advisability of forming alliances with such parties to counter communalism. The stark reality is that despite the fact that Muslims constitute a much larger share of UP’s population as compared to Yadav’s, the propensity of the Yadavization of administrative structure is much stronger while the Muslims can at best expect their lives to be spared in the name of secularism. India’s secularism ostensibly sways between ‘Hindu Rule’ of the “secular parties” of the ruling classes and the ‘Hindu Rashtra’ of the saffron brigade.

Fighting communalism is not merely an electoral issue. The communal forces can be defeated only by ground struggles built by an alliance of the minorities, the working masses, the dalits, the tribals, other oppressed castes and progressive sections of the intelligentsia. In this regard the example held out by the people of Hussainpur, Kheda Gani, Garhi Novabad, Garhi Jaitpur, Kurawa and other such villages is a ray of hope.

OUR DEMANDS

The following demands acquire top most priority in our opinion under the prevailing circumstances:

. All the accused named in the FIRs should be arrested.

. Decommunalize the state apparatus.

. Restore all villagers back to their homes.

. Scrap the affidavit which was taken against five lakh compensation amount.

For the full report go to: http://kafila.org/2014/01/03/independent-inquiry-into-muzaffarnagar-riots-mohan-rao-ish-mishra-pragya-singh-vikas-bajpai/

From DAWN.com, December 31, 2013

Balochistan unrest: VBMP claims 161 extra-judicial killings in 2013

SYED ALI SHAH

QUETTA: Voice for Baloch Missing Persons (VBMP), a non-profit rights group on Tuesday alleged that 161 Baloch political workers were subjected to extra-judicial killings in different parts of Balochistan, Pakistan’s largest province in land mass, during the year 2013.

VBMP chairman Nasrullah Baloch claimed that the gross human rights violations were being committed throughout the year in various parts of the province and ethnic Baloch political workers were picked up in violation of law and constitution.

“Secret services picked up 510 Baloch political workers,” Baloch claimed.

However, the provincial home and tribal affairs department has contradicted the claims and said that the number of missing persons was less as compared to VBMS’s claims.

“The number of missing persons is less than 100 across the province,” an officer of the provincial home and tribal affairs department told Dawn.com on condition of anonymity.

Nasrullah Baloch further said the Balochistan Frontier Corps (FC) chief was also issued a contempt notice by the Supreme Court with regard to the issue of missing Baloch political workers. “Intelligence and military forces consider themselves above the law,” he added.

The VBMP chairman lashed out at the elected democratic government for its failure to bring back the missing persons.

“When they were in opposition, they used to raise voice, but now they have forgotten us,” he added.

He pointed out that a new law was being framed in the country to give what he called limitless powers to intelligence agencies. Baloch urged upon the political forces, human rights organisations and civil society to join hands and stop the government from passing such a law.

The VBMP chairman stated that despite tall claims of the government, mutilated bodies of Baloch political workers were still being recovered from different parts of the province.

From The Hindu, December 31, 2013

JOHN BRISCOE

The balanced work of the Permanent Court of Arbitration means a new dawn for water management in the Indus

The Indus Waters Treaty (IWT), signed by India and Pakistan in 1960, has recently been seen both as the one agreement that has worked between India and Pakistan and as an anachronism which should be dissolved or renegotiated. On December 20, 2013, the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) has issued a judgment which re-calibrates and modernises the IWT and, again makes it a critical and effective instrument in avoiding conflicts between India and Pakistan on use of the rivers of the Indus Basin.

It is first useful to reiterate the central elements of the treaty and the long-standing areas of contention. The IWT assigns use of the eastern rivers (Ravi, Beas and Sutlej) to India and use of the western rivers (Chenab, Jhelum and Indus) to Pakistan. The biggest sticking point in negotiating the treaty in the 1950s was the conditions under which India could use the hydro-electric potential of the Chenab and the Jhelum before the rivers reached Pakistan.

The principle incorporated into the IWT was that, indeed, India could develop this potential, but only under a set of well-defined limitations on the amount of manipulable storage which could be created by India in the process, thus assuring Pakistan that India would not have the ability to manipulate either the timing or the quantities of the flows reaching Pakistan.

In the 1990s, a difference arose about the Baglihar Dam being built by India on the Chenab. Pakistan claimed that low gates installed for flushing sediments violated the specifications of the treaty and endangered Pakistan’s water security because it gave India a capacity to manipulate the timing of flows into Pakistan.

Recipe for conflict

In 2005, a Neutral Expert was appointed to hear the case. His finding essentially said that new knowledge of sediment management technology meant that India had to be allowed to install low gates. His finding ignored the central balance — between India’s right to generate hydropower and Pakistan’s right to unmanipulated flows — in the IWT. Since India plans to build many other projects on the Chenab and Jhelum, if the Baglihar ruling established new ground rules, this would, essentially, give India a free hand to do whatever it liked, leaving Pakistan vulnerable in both perception and practice. This was a recipe for growing conflict and, eventually, even war over the Indus.

In 2010, Pakistan took a new case, that of the Kishenganga hydro-electric project on the Jhelum river, to the International Court of Arbitration. On December 20, 2013, the court issued its final judgment. The Kishenganga case comprised two elements — was India within its rights to build the project and was India able to insert low gates? On the first, limited and specific issue, the court interpreted the treaty literally and accurately and allowed India to proceed. This will somewhat limit the yield of a Pakistani hydropower project being built downstream, but it is not a systemic issue. The big and systemic issue was the second. Here, the court reinforced the hard constraints built into the IWT regarding the ability of India to embed manipulable storage into this and all future projects.

Convenience vs water security

The court pointed out that while it might be convenient for India to build low gates and practise sediment flushing, this was not the only way to manage sediments, and that convenience for India had to be balanced against the threat this would pose to Pakistan’s water security. The court explicitly stated that the Baglihar ruling did not constitute a precedent and implied that the Baglihar Neutral Expert had erred by not balancing engineering concerns with the diplomatic and security factors which were at the heart of the IWT.

The decision by the PCA means that India can, as laid out by the IWT, continue to develop much-needed hydropower projects on the Chenab and the Jhelum, but it must strictly respect the IWT-defined limits on manipulable storage, and must use methods other than the construction of low gates to flush silt.

The court also played close attention to an area which had been neglected in the original IWT, namely environmental flows (e-flows). The court mandated a small, constant release which was less than 10% of what Pakistan claimed to be necessary. Again, the court underlined the importance of balance. “Although the court considered this approach (to defining the e-flow) to be somewhat severe in environmental terms, the court concluded that [….] such an approach represents an appropriate balance between the needs of the environment and India’s right to power generation”. This principle of balance and reasonableness is particularly important because it is inevitable that Pakistan will ask that India release e-flows from the eastern rivers (especially the Ravi and the Sutlej) into areas of Pakistan which have suffered major environmental damage as India has diverted all flows to the east.

The bottom line is that the brilliant and balanced work of the PCA means a new dawn for water management in the Indus. Rumblings over “water wars on the Indus” should now dissipate, and, once again, relationships between India and Pakistan on the Indus should become stable and perhaps have a positive ripple effect on relatioins between the two countries.

(The writer has served as Senior Water Adviser for the World Bank in New Delhi)