If Mumbai can have separate trains for ladies and Cairo can have women-exclusive taxis, why not Lahore and Karachi or some of our smaller cities?
By Ammara Ahmad
Pakistan celebrates the International Women’s Day with passion. Yet, most women in Pakistan live deplorable lives. Whatever ‘improvement’ has occurred in their lot, has been very insignificant and has been carried out at a snail’s pace. Let us just take a look at some of the problems confronting the vast majority of poor women in our country.
The labour rooms of Pakistan’s major government hospitals are terrifying. Most are over-crowded and dirty. If the beds are full, women are made to stand or share beds. Hills of garbage are littered all over the wards, along with crowds of noisy relatives and cranky staff. The women who can actually avail of these wonderful ‘facilities’ are the lucky few as professional healthcare is rarely available to the bulk of the rural women. If one compares these healthcare standards to those in (say) the US or even China, the entire situation becomes very depressing. This comparison is deemed futile by our ‘planning babus’, on the basis that the US is a developed country, unlike Pakistan. But even then, our various governments have had over sixty years to ensure that women don’t die giving birth but with what results?
UNICEF reports state that the under-5 mortality rate here has dropped from 130 in 1990 to 89 in 2008, per 1000 live births. But according to a 2007 report by the Society for the Protection of the Rights of the Child’s (SPARC), Pakistan had the highest infant and mother mortality rate in South Asia. This meant that we were behind India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, the Maldives and maybe even Afghanistan. One really doesn’t see much improvement since then, and one wonders where the UNICEF gets its figures from? According to most international indicators, Pakistan women and their children have been suffering and continue to suffer, the same as before.
Even everyday needs like good transportation facilities are absent for our women. Cities like Lahore and Karachi have plenty of middle class women car drivers. However, they are still very rare in smaller cities like Faisalabad, Gujranwala, Sukkur, Hyderabad and so on. The poorer you are the worst is your transportation problem. In over-crowded buses and vans, women are harassed and jostled. Seats supposedly ‘reserved’ for women are forcibly taken over by men. College and school girls can seldom go out alone. If Mumbai can have separate ladies trains and Cairo can have women exclusive taxis, why not Lahore and Karachi or some of our smaller cities?
A few days back, sitting in the Race Course Park, Lahore became an ordeal for some of my friends. Within minutes, they were accosted and harassed by hordes of frustrated young men, and, ultimately, forced out of the park. Expecting much government support against public place harassment is unrealistic. Even the PPP, Pakistan’s most liberal mainstream party has not been able to pass much significant pro-women legislation, except for the recent, very unsatisfactory Harassment of Women at the Workplace Act of 2009. Indeed, it has not even been able to implement previous acts with any real force or conviction. The Domestic Violence (Prevention and Protection) Act 2009 has, to all intents, simply collapsed. In 2008 alone, the Aurat Foundation reported that there were 7,733 reported cases of violence against women in the country, with perhaps five times that number going unreported. This was first time the Parliament had devised legal and practical measures to curtail home abuse but the Council of Islamic Ideology believed anti-violence laws might increase the divorce rates. Although even the most developed countries cannot completely wipe out domestic violence, yet the state fulfills its duty of formulating anti-violence laws, implementing them firmly and providing institutional support to victims.
The present, ongoing "war on terror" is also taking a big toll on our women. The areas bearing the brunt of the fighting are already poor; and to their existing misery, new dimensions have been now added. With the mass displacement of population from these tribal and frontier areas, women have had to pay a very heavy price. Many of them have previously never stepped out of their homes, kept strictly in ‘purdah’; they have little or no idea how to tackle the harsh realities of life in their camps. Their whole world has been turned topsy-turvy, they and their families are living hand to mouth and bearing up stoically with unbearable hardships. Almost 6000 of the women in various camps were due to give birth last June. WHO declared that the medicines became short within the first week of the displacement. Lady health workers were reluctant to approach the areas due to security threats. Due to "purdah", these women couldn’t go to male doctors. To top it all, the UN report on the women declared that 3 out of 5 of the pregnant women were anemic, with high risk of abortions, and other natal complications, and were in dire need of blood transfusions, surgery, medicines, vitamins and other dietary supplements etc. The report also stated that a number of children were delivered in tents, which was like "giving birth in an oven". The threats of epidemics in the summer months and the harshness of exposed winters are other factors they are contending with. Many of these women also lacked male family members or escorts and were consequently struggling for food and basic necessities as well as protection in strange new localities.
Why should all this be relevant over here? One of the chief feminist arguments against war is that wars are started, planned, financed and largely fought by men; yet take a disproportionate toll of women and children. The plight of the displaced women as stated above is typical of women trapped in violent conflicts; women who are poor, displaced, with missing husbands and with children to feed. The terror, crimes and humiliation the internally displaced Pakistani women have suffered and are suffering is still largely undocumented and frightening to contemplate. A lot of coverage is given to the war, daily, and the number of militants killed etc — but how many channels at home or abroad have given comprehensive coverage to the women in the camps?
On Women’s Day, an advertisement sponsored by the Ministry of Youth, Government of Pakistan appeared in the press. It stated: "We mothers, We sisters, We daughters, The honor of the nation is from us." How do we ‘honor’ our women — mothers, sisters, daughters, today, in the face of the above, select examples? This is worth contemplating at this time, instead of all the hypocrisy and cant that usually prevails. We women are not mere relatives to our male counterparts but also individuals, humans, citizens. It is high time we received what are our essential rights.
Mar 15, 2010
"We have the capacity to come together"
By Zaman Khan
Rita Manchanda is General Secretary, South Asia Forum for Human Rights (Delhi) and Research Director of SAFHR (Nepal) project. Earlier, she was Gender Expert, Commonwealth Technical Fund in Sri Lanka. At SAFHR, she founded and developed the programmes such as Women Conflict and Peace-building and Media and Conflict. For many years, Rita has worked as a professional journalist in both the print and electronic media. She has written extensively on security and human rights issues. Among her many publications is the book entitled, Women War and Peace in South Asia: beyond Victimhood to Agency. Her research study on Naga Women in the Peace Process is a benchmark contribution in the field studies of gendered war narratives. She has also written extensively on minority rights. Her professional experience in India’s Defence Ministry’s think tank, Institute for Defence Studies and Analysis, has motivated her to explore alternate ways of looking at issues. Her writings on Nepal in Frontline Magazine and Economic and Political Weekly are widely commended for their insight and prescient value. Married to journalist and peace activist Tapan Bose, she has been a peace activist. Rita was in Pakistan for a week. Zaman Khan was able to talk to her in Lahore. Excerpts follow:
The News on Sunday: What brings you to Pakistan?
Rita Manchanda: There is a research project I am involved in. I am also looking at Pakistan and what kind of research is possible here. But I also came to take a stock of what is happening in Pakistan — the peace process between India and Pakistan. The need of the moment is to re-energise or to rethink some of our peace strategies.
TNS: How do you look at the peace process between India and Pakistan?
RM: I think one needs to see what is happening at the official level and what is desirable as far as peoples’ efforts are concerned to strengthen the peace process. As far as governments are concerned, it is quite evident that this is a process that is being driven reluctantly. Negotiators are being pushed to the table because of the third party and that is the US. It is the worst reason to move forward to make peace. If peace is driven by these considerations it cannot really achieve much. Nevertheless, any effort to start the dialogue is welcome.
TNS: But people to people contacts seem to have lost momentum, why?
RM: There have been many efforts and initiatives since the time it first took off — in the early nineties — and at that time too the circumstances were very difficult. We were talking about war clouds, nuclear war clouds. Even then the initiative was taken and an effort made. It is quite clear that governments on both sides seem to have a different attitude towards granting visas to people who are engaged with each other, especially in the cultural context. But when it comes to groups that are interested in talking politics that have people to people agenda the two governments seem to be very reluctant to grant visas. This certainly constrained the possibilities of development of the people-to-people contacts. And, certainly, I know we are waiting for a Pak-India Forum delegation to join us but I don’t think they are going to get visas. And yet you can see other groups that are getting visas, other groups that are more focused in the cultural context.
TNS: Don’t you think we should be more creative in looking for ways to keep the peace process moving?
RM: Certainly, that means we need to concentrate on within our countries. We have to do a great deal to change public opinion. Recently, the India chapter of Pak-India Forum launched a new chapter in Bhubashnaer in Orisa and it was in fact very heartening for me when I went there to participate in the launch of this new chapter because you could see the people who came from Eastern India. They have a very different perception of the dialogue. To me, the strength of Pak-India Forum is its capacity to develop linkages. Why is it that so many forums are part of Pak-India forum? It is because they can see the connections, something very direct. It is, in fact, the capacity of the forum to develop these kinds of linkages; to make people understand that confrontational relationship in India and Pakistan has actually undermined the basic issue of democracy. And other rights which are sacrificed because of the raise in the defence expenditure. This, in turn, keeps this hate and intolerance alive. Even if the governments are determined to keep us apart, text books, which have been a major agenda of the forum, can make a difference. We need to revive some of that work. There is no reason why we can’t work together, even if it means separately. We have the capacity to come together.
TNS: Pakistan government has been alleging that India is helping insurgents in Balochistan besides playing a negative role in Afghanistan. At the same time, India talks about non-state actors and accuses Pakistan of supporting them. In this milieu, how can the peace process achieve results?
RM: It is quite interesting that our home minister has said that there is no difference in state and non-state actors. A lot of this is played out for the media. I think many of these statements, speaking from India, raised the confrontational level. The statements are made because there is an active lobby against any movement towards the peace processes and that includes the section of the army to some extent and that also includes the BJP. Such an attitude has very little to do with the determination to resolve an issue. As I have already said these moves are US-driven. I have no idea what the Indian government is doing in Balochistan, or not doing in Balochistan. So far, we don’t have any evidence of the nature of India’s involvement. The issue of Balochistan was included in the Sharm al Sheikh statement and that came as a bit of a shock. It was for the first time you had the official acknowledgment that there was something to discuss. What is interesting is that no evidence has come forward. But if there are troubled waters, there would be many agencies fishing.
TNS: You must be aware of the view which says that India wants to turn Pakistan into a desert by denying the country its share of water?
RM: Yes. Today I read an editorial in a Pakistani newspaper which used the term ‘water terrorism’. It came as a bit of a shock. There are groups in both India and Pakistan that have been expressing concern at the Indus Water Treaty. In Kashmir, Farooq Abdullah is on record saying that the Indus Water Treaty has betrayed the Indian interests. On the other side of the border you also have people saying that Indus Water Treaty has betrayed their interests. World Bank brokered a treaty some time back. Now we know that there were very special circumstances that enabled the treaty to be finalized. I can quote Dr. Mubashir Hasan who is an expert in this area. He challenged the perception that there is such a thing as ‘water terrorism’. There is reason to see why this issue has cropped up at this particular point in time. Certainly, these are issues that need to be addressed seriously.
TNS: As a woman journalist, did you feel handicapped in India?
RM: I worked on security issues and I think I was the only woman at that point of time working on these issues. You have advantages of being a woman but you also have disadvantages of not being taken seriously. One of my first jobs was with the Telegraph. It had just started. We had a very dynamic editor, M. J Akbar, and practically an all-female bureau. Some of the names of those bureau people are some of the best journalists of our time. It was a very unusual experiment. It worked very well. Yes, because I was a woman I got a lot of doors opened to me. We had to work twice as hard to be taken seriously. I think we had an editor who believed that we could do the hard beat. All the women I am talking about in this bureau did the hard beat.
TNS: What about your research?
RM: We wanted to do something that was worth. While I also worked in NDTV I worked in Press Channel, a new channel at that point of time. I worked in Doordarshan which was a very exciting period. I also did business channels because that was the time of the economy opening up. I have been always sensitive to gender issues. I started looking at a different interpretation of security. I called it feminising security. And I started looking at women’s role in conflict and peace-building. It was an attempt to explore; to make visible what women did in conflict situations and what women did during peace time. The issue is the peoples’ struggle against land alienation caused by corporatisation of land by multi-nationals coming in a big way and taking over peoples’ land. You cannot have development policies that marginalise the majority of population. And that is what our both states are doing. This is a common agenda.
TNS: Pakistan is also giving land to foreigners?
RM: It is not only foreign multi-nationals. In India, we have huge multi-nationals like TATAs and Mitils. These are, in fact, global multi-nationals today. I went to Orisa in East India. PASCO, the South Korean giant, has already been given a contract. There are areas where the land is rich as cash crops are grown there. People grow three crops there. Why would they surrender their land? They also know that despite the promises that they make — that people will be absorbed in the industry — they know that they don’t have the skills. They have been marginalised by the new development policies. It is not that this is something new but there is much greater exploitation here.
TNS: India is developing very fast but at the same time the poverty level is increasing.
RM: The middle class in India is likely about 250 million people. It is a huge population. Of course, India is not silent and today the biggest internal security challenge, as the Indian government itself recognises, comes from Maoists in India. I think 30 percent of the land area of India is affected by Maoists. Maoists have, in fact, become the political force that has been able to channelise the disaffection. India believes that it can continue with growth which is 7-8 percent. The Maoists challenge is a reminder that you cannot ignore the majority of your population.
TNS: Briefly tell us about your books?
RM: I have been working on two areas — conflict and peace-building. In my current research I am looking at the peace processes in South Asia. I am also looking at Pakistan but that will be a research team that will look at Pakistan, the whole federal question. We are trying to explore what is often considered the panacea of society. We want to see what do they mean by democracy and what do they actually need from peoples’ rights for entitlement and inclusive politics. The other area I have been exploring is minority rights and there is a book which came out last year called ‘No-nonsense Guide to Minority Rights in South Asia’. We are looking at multiple ways at addressing the minority rights question. A community that is a minority in one country is a majority in another country. You cannot actually address these questions only within your own countries. You have to look at the framework which is also cross border framework.
TNS: Where do you place women in your studies?
RM: The gender dimension is always very much at the forefront of what I am doing. I argue that civil society is an important element in democratising the peace process and the core of the civil society are the women groups.
TNS: You have been monitoring violations of human rights in the Indian occupied Kashmir. How do you look at the Kashmir issue vis-a-vis women?
RM: As a journalist I have been covering Kashmir since 1990 and it is a conflict I have been involved in both as an activist as well as a researcher. I wrote a chapter in a book called, "Guns and Burqa". It is a gender narrative of women in the Kashmir conflict exploring the possibilities of women’s role in peace-building in Kashmir.
TNS: Do you hope we will be able to resolve the issue of Kashmir?
RM: I will have to be a realist about it. There are great many interests involved in keeping the Kashmir issue unresolved and there is a false sense that Kashmir issue has been contained. In India, we have a whole series of very good committees set up to explore certain dimensions of Kashmir issue. One of the committees was headed by our current vice-president. His report was on confidence-building measures, some of which might have taken us to a big step forward. But the report has been shelved. The recommendations have been ignored. There have to be other ways of addressing the Kashmir issue. We cannot actually leave it to the state. Peace is too important to be left to them.
Rita Manchanda is General Secretary, South Asia Forum for Human Rights (Delhi) and Research Director of SAFHR (Nepal) project. Earlier, she was Gender Expert, Commonwealth Technical Fund in Sri Lanka. At SAFHR, she founded and developed the programmes such as Women Conflict and Peace-building and Media and Conflict. For many years, Rita has worked as a professional journalist in both the print and electronic media. She has written extensively on security and human rights issues. Among her many publications is the book entitled, Women War and Peace in South Asia: beyond Victimhood to Agency. Her research study on Naga Women in the Peace Process is a benchmark contribution in the field studies of gendered war narratives. She has also written extensively on minority rights. Her professional experience in India’s Defence Ministry’s think tank, Institute for Defence Studies and Analysis, has motivated her to explore alternate ways of looking at issues. Her writings on Nepal in Frontline Magazine and Economic and Political Weekly are widely commended for their insight and prescient value. Married to journalist and peace activist Tapan Bose, she has been a peace activist. Rita was in Pakistan for a week. Zaman Khan was able to talk to her in Lahore. Excerpts follow:
The News on Sunday: What brings you to Pakistan?
Rita Manchanda: There is a research project I am involved in. I am also looking at Pakistan and what kind of research is possible here. But I also came to take a stock of what is happening in Pakistan — the peace process between India and Pakistan. The need of the moment is to re-energise or to rethink some of our peace strategies.
TNS: How do you look at the peace process between India and Pakistan?
RM: I think one needs to see what is happening at the official level and what is desirable as far as peoples’ efforts are concerned to strengthen the peace process. As far as governments are concerned, it is quite evident that this is a process that is being driven reluctantly. Negotiators are being pushed to the table because of the third party and that is the US. It is the worst reason to move forward to make peace. If peace is driven by these considerations it cannot really achieve much. Nevertheless, any effort to start the dialogue is welcome.
TNS: But people to people contacts seem to have lost momentum, why?
RM: There have been many efforts and initiatives since the time it first took off — in the early nineties — and at that time too the circumstances were very difficult. We were talking about war clouds, nuclear war clouds. Even then the initiative was taken and an effort made. It is quite clear that governments on both sides seem to have a different attitude towards granting visas to people who are engaged with each other, especially in the cultural context. But when it comes to groups that are interested in talking politics that have people to people agenda the two governments seem to be very reluctant to grant visas. This certainly constrained the possibilities of development of the people-to-people contacts. And, certainly, I know we are waiting for a Pak-India Forum delegation to join us but I don’t think they are going to get visas. And yet you can see other groups that are getting visas, other groups that are more focused in the cultural context.
TNS: Don’t you think we should be more creative in looking for ways to keep the peace process moving?
RM: Certainly, that means we need to concentrate on within our countries. We have to do a great deal to change public opinion. Recently, the India chapter of Pak-India Forum launched a new chapter in Bhubashnaer in Orisa and it was in fact very heartening for me when I went there to participate in the launch of this new chapter because you could see the people who came from Eastern India. They have a very different perception of the dialogue. To me, the strength of Pak-India Forum is its capacity to develop linkages. Why is it that so many forums are part of Pak-India forum? It is because they can see the connections, something very direct. It is, in fact, the capacity of the forum to develop these kinds of linkages; to make people understand that confrontational relationship in India and Pakistan has actually undermined the basic issue of democracy. And other rights which are sacrificed because of the raise in the defence expenditure. This, in turn, keeps this hate and intolerance alive. Even if the governments are determined to keep us apart, text books, which have been a major agenda of the forum, can make a difference. We need to revive some of that work. There is no reason why we can’t work together, even if it means separately. We have the capacity to come together.
TNS: Pakistan government has been alleging that India is helping insurgents in Balochistan besides playing a negative role in Afghanistan. At the same time, India talks about non-state actors and accuses Pakistan of supporting them. In this milieu, how can the peace process achieve results?
RM: It is quite interesting that our home minister has said that there is no difference in state and non-state actors. A lot of this is played out for the media. I think many of these statements, speaking from India, raised the confrontational level. The statements are made because there is an active lobby against any movement towards the peace processes and that includes the section of the army to some extent and that also includes the BJP. Such an attitude has very little to do with the determination to resolve an issue. As I have already said these moves are US-driven. I have no idea what the Indian government is doing in Balochistan, or not doing in Balochistan. So far, we don’t have any evidence of the nature of India’s involvement. The issue of Balochistan was included in the Sharm al Sheikh statement and that came as a bit of a shock. It was for the first time you had the official acknowledgment that there was something to discuss. What is interesting is that no evidence has come forward. But if there are troubled waters, there would be many agencies fishing.
TNS: You must be aware of the view which says that India wants to turn Pakistan into a desert by denying the country its share of water?
RM: Yes. Today I read an editorial in a Pakistani newspaper which used the term ‘water terrorism’. It came as a bit of a shock. There are groups in both India and Pakistan that have been expressing concern at the Indus Water Treaty. In Kashmir, Farooq Abdullah is on record saying that the Indus Water Treaty has betrayed the Indian interests. On the other side of the border you also have people saying that Indus Water Treaty has betrayed their interests. World Bank brokered a treaty some time back. Now we know that there were very special circumstances that enabled the treaty to be finalized. I can quote Dr. Mubashir Hasan who is an expert in this area. He challenged the perception that there is such a thing as ‘water terrorism’. There is reason to see why this issue has cropped up at this particular point in time. Certainly, these are issues that need to be addressed seriously.
TNS: As a woman journalist, did you feel handicapped in India?
RM: I worked on security issues and I think I was the only woman at that point of time working on these issues. You have advantages of being a woman but you also have disadvantages of not being taken seriously. One of my first jobs was with the Telegraph. It had just started. We had a very dynamic editor, M. J Akbar, and practically an all-female bureau. Some of the names of those bureau people are some of the best journalists of our time. It was a very unusual experiment. It worked very well. Yes, because I was a woman I got a lot of doors opened to me. We had to work twice as hard to be taken seriously. I think we had an editor who believed that we could do the hard beat. All the women I am talking about in this bureau did the hard beat.
TNS: What about your research?
RM: We wanted to do something that was worth. While I also worked in NDTV I worked in Press Channel, a new channel at that point of time. I worked in Doordarshan which was a very exciting period. I also did business channels because that was the time of the economy opening up. I have been always sensitive to gender issues. I started looking at a different interpretation of security. I called it feminising security. And I started looking at women’s role in conflict and peace-building. It was an attempt to explore; to make visible what women did in conflict situations and what women did during peace time. The issue is the peoples’ struggle against land alienation caused by corporatisation of land by multi-nationals coming in a big way and taking over peoples’ land. You cannot have development policies that marginalise the majority of population. And that is what our both states are doing. This is a common agenda.
TNS: Pakistan is also giving land to foreigners?
RM: It is not only foreign multi-nationals. In India, we have huge multi-nationals like TATAs and Mitils. These are, in fact, global multi-nationals today. I went to Orisa in East India. PASCO, the South Korean giant, has already been given a contract. There are areas where the land is rich as cash crops are grown there. People grow three crops there. Why would they surrender their land? They also know that despite the promises that they make — that people will be absorbed in the industry — they know that they don’t have the skills. They have been marginalised by the new development policies. It is not that this is something new but there is much greater exploitation here.
TNS: India is developing very fast but at the same time the poverty level is increasing.
RM: The middle class in India is likely about 250 million people. It is a huge population. Of course, India is not silent and today the biggest internal security challenge, as the Indian government itself recognises, comes from Maoists in India. I think 30 percent of the land area of India is affected by Maoists. Maoists have, in fact, become the political force that has been able to channelise the disaffection. India believes that it can continue with growth which is 7-8 percent. The Maoists challenge is a reminder that you cannot ignore the majority of your population.
TNS: Briefly tell us about your books?
RM: I have been working on two areas — conflict and peace-building. In my current research I am looking at the peace processes in South Asia. I am also looking at Pakistan but that will be a research team that will look at Pakistan, the whole federal question. We are trying to explore what is often considered the panacea of society. We want to see what do they mean by democracy and what do they actually need from peoples’ rights for entitlement and inclusive politics. The other area I have been exploring is minority rights and there is a book which came out last year called ‘No-nonsense Guide to Minority Rights in South Asia’. We are looking at multiple ways at addressing the minority rights question. A community that is a minority in one country is a majority in another country. You cannot actually address these questions only within your own countries. You have to look at the framework which is also cross border framework.
TNS: Where do you place women in your studies?
RM: The gender dimension is always very much at the forefront of what I am doing. I argue that civil society is an important element in democratising the peace process and the core of the civil society are the women groups.
TNS: You have been monitoring violations of human rights in the Indian occupied Kashmir. How do you look at the Kashmir issue vis-a-vis women?
RM: As a journalist I have been covering Kashmir since 1990 and it is a conflict I have been involved in both as an activist as well as a researcher. I wrote a chapter in a book called, "Guns and Burqa". It is a gender narrative of women in the Kashmir conflict exploring the possibilities of women’s role in peace-building in Kashmir.
TNS: Do you hope we will be able to resolve the issue of Kashmir?
RM: I will have to be a realist about it. There are great many interests involved in keeping the Kashmir issue unresolved and there is a false sense that Kashmir issue has been contained. In India, we have a whole series of very good committees set up to explore certain dimensions of Kashmir issue. One of the committees was headed by our current vice-president. His report was on confidence-building measures, some of which might have taken us to a big step forward. But the report has been shelved. The recommendations have been ignored. There have to be other ways of addressing the Kashmir issue. We cannot actually leave it to the state. Peace is too important to be left to them.
From Aman ki Asha to Aman ki Bhasha
Both Indians and Pakistanis share the same helplessness
— a consequence of a long drawn war that neither side wants
By R Vasundara
Even as the Aman Ki Asha campaign is surging ahead, opening dialogues and cultural exchanges between India and Pakistan, a few others have been inspired by its success to do their bit in lessening bitterness and strife between the two countries.
One such movement is the Aman ki Bhasha campaign, formed by a group of peace activists from both India and Pakistan.
"This concept was evolved during a 10-day meet between peace activists from the SAARC countries in Kathmandu," said Faizur Rehman, a Chennai-based peace activist who is one of the founders of this campaign.
"The Indian and Pakistani delegates got along like a house on fire. We’d often gather together for informal discussions and we realised that all the mistrust and conflict are really due to a lack of communication on both sides. That’s when we hit upon the idea of a cultural exchange programme. And the name Aman ki Bhasha or Language of Peace made perfect sense to us since Aman ki Asha has already given the peace process a big boost."
His counterpart in Pakistan, Shafqat Mehmood, a retired brigadier working in Waziristan in North-West Pakistan that border Afghanistan, and the chairperson of Paiman Alumni Trust, was equally enthusiastic about the idea. "All dealings between the two countries have hitherto been completely at governments’ level," he explained.
"As a result, even when peace processes and summits are initiated, the smallest hitch sets us back by two years. And bringing them up in international forums has only served to worsen it due to trans-national interventions," said Mehmood, adding, "We shall be initiating an exchange programme, where people of both countries visit each other, spend a few days together and get acquainted with the ground realities. I believe that both Indians and Pakistanis share the same helplessness –– a consequence of a long drawn war that neither side wants."
Reiterating Mehmood’s statement, Rehman felt that both countries share similar sentiments regarding the peace process. "It’s the same on both sides," he said. "Some people want to whole-heartedly extend their hand, some are hesitant to do that and some thoroughly mistrust the other side. We need to break down the ice."
However, both sides are well aware that any initiative turns into a deadlock when the Kashmir issue comes up. "If we can’t eliminate a problem, it’s better to just defuse it," declared Mehmood. "When it comes to the Kashmir issue, since we can’t resolve the situation, why not maintain status quo and let things take its own course. It will give both sides the opportunity to lessen the bitterness and tension and some much needed relief."
Courtesy: The Times of India
caption
The Indian and the Pakistani delegates who came together to form the Aman ki Bhasha campaign pose during a conference;
Faizur Rehman, a Chennai-based peace activist represented India.
— a consequence of a long drawn war that neither side wants
By R Vasundara
Even as the Aman Ki Asha campaign is surging ahead, opening dialogues and cultural exchanges between India and Pakistan, a few others have been inspired by its success to do their bit in lessening bitterness and strife between the two countries.
One such movement is the Aman ki Bhasha campaign, formed by a group of peace activists from both India and Pakistan.
"This concept was evolved during a 10-day meet between peace activists from the SAARC countries in Kathmandu," said Faizur Rehman, a Chennai-based peace activist who is one of the founders of this campaign.
"The Indian and Pakistani delegates got along like a house on fire. We’d often gather together for informal discussions and we realised that all the mistrust and conflict are really due to a lack of communication on both sides. That’s when we hit upon the idea of a cultural exchange programme. And the name Aman ki Bhasha or Language of Peace made perfect sense to us since Aman ki Asha has already given the peace process a big boost."
His counterpart in Pakistan, Shafqat Mehmood, a retired brigadier working in Waziristan in North-West Pakistan that border Afghanistan, and the chairperson of Paiman Alumni Trust, was equally enthusiastic about the idea. "All dealings between the two countries have hitherto been completely at governments’ level," he explained.
"As a result, even when peace processes and summits are initiated, the smallest hitch sets us back by two years. And bringing them up in international forums has only served to worsen it due to trans-national interventions," said Mehmood, adding, "We shall be initiating an exchange programme, where people of both countries visit each other, spend a few days together and get acquainted with the ground realities. I believe that both Indians and Pakistanis share the same helplessness –– a consequence of a long drawn war that neither side wants."
Reiterating Mehmood’s statement, Rehman felt that both countries share similar sentiments regarding the peace process. "It’s the same on both sides," he said. "Some people want to whole-heartedly extend their hand, some are hesitant to do that and some thoroughly mistrust the other side. We need to break down the ice."
However, both sides are well aware that any initiative turns into a deadlock when the Kashmir issue comes up. "If we can’t eliminate a problem, it’s better to just defuse it," declared Mehmood. "When it comes to the Kashmir issue, since we can’t resolve the situation, why not maintain status quo and let things take its own course. It will give both sides the opportunity to lessen the bitterness and tension and some much needed relief."
Courtesy: The Times of India
caption
The Indian and the Pakistani delegates who came together to form the Aman ki Bhasha campaign pose during a conference;
Faizur Rehman, a Chennai-based peace activist represented India.
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