Breaking through the class ceiling

Indian society is made of hierarchies of class. We keep on judging persons and mentally classifying them if they are above us, at our same level or are below us. It happens inside our families, in our work places, when we go out, when we meet someone. This classification decides how we behave with them.

I am arguing that this class-based mindset is a barrier to development of India.

For the past few days, since the 23 year old girl was brutally raped and dumped from a moving bus in Delhi, I have been reading about the growing public outrage and protests, as well as, the reflections of persons about it.

For example, Shoma Chaudhury from Tahelka has written in her opinion piece:

THE SURGING outrage at the gangrape of a paramedic in New Delhi this week is welcome and cathartic. But it is also terrifying. There’s a fear that this too shall fade without correctives. But there is also a question we must all face: why did it need an incident so unspeakably brutal to trigger our outrage? What does that say about our collective threshold as a society? Why did hundreds of other stories of rape not suffice to prick our conscience?

The harsh truth is, rape is not deviant in India: it is rampant. The attitude that enables it sits embedded in our brain. Rape is almost culturally sanctioned in India, made possible by crude, unthinking conversations in every strata of society. Conversations that look at crime against women through the prism of women’s responsibility: were they adequately dressed, were they accompanied by a male protector, were they of sterling ‘character’, were they cautious enough.

Something about these discussions in the newspapers and magazines has intrigued me – while talking about the victim of the rape, they always add that she is “a paramedic”. Initial newspaper reports had talked about her being “a medical student”. Later on, reporters must have discovered other information and had become more specific – the girl is not a medical student but a paramedical course student.

How does it matter if the girl who is raped is a medical student or is studying to be a lab technician or a nursing assistant? And, why do newspaper or magazine have to specify it every time they write about it? Isn’t it enough to say “a young girl”? or a university student?

I can understand that when the news broke out, newspaper had to provide some information about the girl and her background. But why do they need to keep on specifying it, or rather, defining the girl in terms of her studies?

I feel that one of the reasons why we keep on specifying the study course of that girl is because we are very class-conscious. After visiting a number of countries in different continents, I think that Indian society is one of the most class-conscious societies in the world.

Perhaps the most defining criteria of this class consciousness is persons’ socio-economic background, their professions, incomes, etc. We behave differently with people who work as waiters, drivers, security guards, domestic helpers, cleaners etc. compared to how we behave with people higher up in hierarchy.

However, there are many other criteria to classify people and to calculate their relative place in the world around us. Gender is one such criteria, women are lower in hierarchy. If women claim higher hierarchical space, because of their socio-economic status, as soon as there is an opportunity, men placed lower down on their hierarchy, feel justified to “put them in their place”. Groping, violence and rape are some ways of putting women in their place.

Caste is another criteria for defining your place in the hierarchy of the Indian society. Comparatively, some attention has been given to issues related to caste discrimination. For those placed in the lowest margins of the caste system, parts of Indian society have asked for the removal of untouchability and affirmative action for their inclusion in areas of education and livelihood. However, we do not seem to have any problems with caste system if these "extremes" can be corrected. I wonder if only overcoming the stark discriminations against Dalits, would make the remaining caste-based hierarchies acceptable?

The language we speak, and the clothes we wear are other markers of our place in the social hierarchy. In “English Vinglish”, Shashi (Sridevi) says with a wry smile, “Important things are discussed only in English.” If you can’t speak English properly, you lose your place in the social hierarchy in India. Just a look at the smug publicity of “English medium” schools and the demand for “convent school educated” brides in the matrimonial columns is enough to state the obvious superiority of English. Even the poor and the uneducated persons know this and are willing to make sacrifices so that their children can repeat English nursery rhymes.

Every now and then I receive congratulatory messages from friends and acquaintances for “writing in Hindi”. I don’t know if there is another country in the world, where people are congratulated for their skills in writing or talking in their mother tongue, and where not being able to speak properly in the mother tongue is seen as sign of higher social status.

If Hindi is much lower compared to English in our social hierarchy, Hindiwallas look disdainfully at those who speak Maithili or Bhojpuri. Speaking sanskritized Hindi or refined Urdu is higher social status marker compared to those speak ordinary Hindustani.

Being from a big city, compared to being from a hinterland city or worse, being from a village, the colour of your skin, etc. are also markers of social status. This list of criteria for defining your place in social hierarchy goes on and on.

Unfortunately, these differences are not about human diversity, but they affect every aspect of our lives. For example, they determine, the kind of jobs you can have, the kind of news-worthiness you will have, and how the Indian system will treat you in your daily life.

There have been many social reformers in India who have spoken about the negative role of untouchability and caste exclusion, but there has been much less debate about the our rigid class-hierarchies and the impact these have on our lives and on our nation. One exception to this was Swami Vivekanand. Mr. Pranav Mukherjee, president of India, recently wrote in an article in the Week about the 150 birth anniversary of Swami Vivekanand:

Before he went to America in 1893, Swamiji spent a few years travelling all over India as a wandering monk. During these travels he was deeply moved by the destitution and backwardness of millions of ordinary Indians. However, he also saw that, in spite of poverty, the ancient spiritual culture was a powerful force in their lives. Swamiji concluded that the real cause of India's backwardness was the neglect and exploitation of the masses who produced the wealth of the land…Swamiji was intensely pained at the caste discrimination prevalent in India and full of sympathy for the poor and suffering of all nations, castes and creeds. He held the neglect of the masses and the subjugation of women to be the two causes of India's downfall.

Living in India, often it is difficult to become aware of these class hierarchies that permeate our lives. They are so pervasive and ingrained in our minds that they look like “natural phenomenon”, something god-given and thus, impossible to change.

Everyone in this system has some one else who is lower in some kind of hierarchy from them. While we chafe at the highhandedness and callousness of those above us, we are equally brutal in our behaviour towards those who we perceive as lower than us.

How can we break these barriers? Can India truly develop without breaking down these barriers?

***

Firoze Manji: The Voice of Africa

Firoze Manji is founder and editor of Pambazuka News, a newsletter with articles, news and links about different countries, people, civil society organisations and movements of Africa. Pambazuka News provides weekly information and links to articles on new developments in Africa in English, French and Portuguese by email. You can also read Pambazuka News along with its archive of hundreds of articles on its website.

Recently I interviewed Firoze through email for an article in the AIFO magazine. So this interview will appear in Italian in the issue of June 2012.

I think that for all persons interested in development issues in Africa and in reading and listening to the more important voices of African thinkers and civil society leaders, Pambazuka News is one of the most important gateways. I join Firoze in asking you to become friends of Pambazuka and help in maintaining it independent.

Here is the interview

Sunil: How did the idea of Pambazuka came and how was the idea turned into reality?

Firoze: Pambazuka News was the serendipitous offspring of a programme established to harness ICTs for strengthening the human rights movement in Africa. Its birth was intimately intertwined with an attempt to develop distance learning materials for civil society organisations in Africa. In 1997, Fahamu (ndr: an African network of civil society organisations with offices in Kenya, South Africa and Senegal) set out to examine how developments in information and communications technologies can be harnessed to support the growth of human rights and civil society organisations in Africa. Like many others, we saw the potentials opening up with the growth in access to the internet. One of the outcomes was that we began receiving requests from human rights and other civil society organisations for assistance in finding information on the web, and with disseminating information about their own work.

Initially, we responded on a case-by-case basis, sending off the results of searches or disseminating by email information we had received from others to those on our modest contacts list. But soon the demand became overwhelming. We simply could not respond to all the requests we received.

We decided to establish Pambazuka News as a means of sharing information relevant to the this constituency, but rather than just send out information, we decided also to include op-eds that would provoke reflections about the potentials for freedom and justice in Africa. From a small base of subscribers in December 2000, Pambazuka News has grown rapidly with 28,000 subscribers, and an estimated readership approaching one million. Today we publish some 20-30 articles every week, with contributions from more than 3200 authors across the continent and the African diaspora.

We have published some 580 issues of the English edition of Pambazuka News over the 11 years of our existence. And four years ago, we started publishing a French language edition, and two years ago a Portuguese language edition.

Pambazuka News is used widely by activists, commentators, social movements, alliances and networks to foster debate, disseminate analyses and share information. We monitor some 250 websites related to Africa, and publish summaries every week of some 100 sites.

Sunil: What are the biggest challenges Pambazuka has faced since its inception

Firoze: Perhaps the greatest challenge we have faced has been to keep up with the demand from the growing constituencies that depend on Pambazuka News as an advocacy tool as well as to get an African progressive perspective on Africa and world affairs. To respond to these demands means that we need the necessary resources, and those are hard to find.

There are very few funders who fully understand the importance of what we do, despite the fact that most of them depend on Pambazuka News as a source of analysis and information. And with the growing African awakening that we have written about in our recent book "African Awakening: the emerging revolutions", there is a critical need for Pambazuka News to grow and provide support for the struggles for freedom and justice taking place across the continent.

Which is why we have decided to turn to our readership: we have asked our readers to join the Friends of Pambazuka and to donate to keep Pambazuka free and independent.

Sunil: In which ways Pambazuka has changed and evolved since the beginning?

Firoze: Pambazuka News has grown substantially in terms of the amount of coverage provided as well as the quality of the articles. We have attracted some of the leading thinkers across the continent to write commentary and analyses, while a the same time providing a platform for social movements such as Abahlali base Mjondolo in South Africa and the Bunge la Mwaninchi in Kenya.

We have produced radio programmes as well as podcasts and multimedia materials such as the 'Burden of Peace", a documentary on violence against women during the post-election violence in Kenya. In 2008 we expanded our operations to including a book publishing enterprise - Pambazuka Press. Today, Pambazuka News is produced by staff in Senegal, Kenyam South Africa and UK.

Sunil: Who are the most popular writers or star writers at Pambazuka?

Firoze: There are many 'star writers' such as Mahmood Mamdani, Sokari Ekine, Samir Amin, Horace Campbell, Issa Shivji and many others who are well known - but we are proud that there are many regular contributors from social movements and the activist community who also write and who enrich the dialogue, debates and analyses that appear in Pambazuka News.

Sunil: Any information campaigns launched by Pambazuka that resulted in change on the ground?

Firoze: Perhaps the best known campaigns was the support we provided to the campaign for the ratification of the Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa, coalition of some 30 regional organisations, producing special issues profiling important aspects of the protocol as well as publishing a 6-part radio soap opera in English, French, Portuguese and Kiswahili.

We also developed and hosted a petition on the Pambazuka News website in support of women’s rights that involved the development of an SMS function that enabled people to sign the petition by SMS and receive SMS updates about the campaign. This campaign led to the fastest ratification of any international instrument in the history of Africa - today more than 30 countries in Africa have ratified the protocol.

Sunil: How does Pambazuka reach out to French and Portuguese speaking Africa?

Firoze: We publish a French and Portuguese language edition of Pambazuka News. Originally we thought that these editions would be merely translations of the English edition, but in practice these are distinct editions, with articles originated in those languages. As a result, the three editions of Pambazuka News contain articles that have been cross translated from each other.

Sunil: Is there going to be a Kiswahili Pambazuka?

Firoze: I would hope so. There are certainly demands for a Kiswahili edition, but this will require raising resources to make that possible. We also want to develop an Arabic language edition of Pambazuka News, and are trying to raise the necessary resources for that.

***

Women changing rural India: Sarpanch Sahib

Common perception is that in spite of poverty and under-development, women in South Asia have played a much more active role in leadership and politics of their countries and their communities than in the western “developed” world. Persons like Sirimavo Bhandaranayike, Indira Gandhi, Sheikh Hasina, Benazir Bhutto, Mayawati and Aung San Kyi are responsible for this common perception. Yet, those who know the reality of our world, know that for most women, especially in rural areas, their lives are often closed in the boundaries of traditions, hidden behind veils, bound by rules of caste and class.

India started an experiment in 1993 to change this apparently immutable world of rural women by reserving certain election seats at village council level (Gram Panchayats) for them. At that time, many persons had thought that this would not change anything, men will continue to decide and rule as usual, using their wives or mothers or daughter-in-laws as a cover.

Initially almost all the women who entered the poltical arena because of this policy, were in some way forced by their families. Most of them did not receive any training for the roles they were asked to take on. Almost fifteen years later, it is perhaps time to take stock and understand how this change has worked out in practice and if indeed there has been a change?

Yes, in spite of all the cynicism and active obstruction by old political power-brokers, the experiment has started to bring about a change. “Sarpanch Sahib – Changing the face of India”, edited by Manjima Bhattacharjya (Harper Collins India with India Today and The Hunger Project, 2009), tells the stories of some such women who became presidents of their Gram Panchayats (village councils).

The stories of the book are told by women like Manju Kapur, Indira Maya Ganesh, etc. and are immensely readable. They talk of villages from different parts of India. To understand what these women went through and continue to pass through, what it means for them to live lives of poverty and yet strive for better governance against all odds, makes for a humbling experience.

I liked all the stories. They are succcess stories, even if they show that nothing is easy and at times, the idea of “success” does not quite express what they have achieved. They show that change in the unchanging world of rural poverty, could be almost imperceptible. Like the story of a person like Kenchamma, a dalit woman, who continues to shell betel nuts for a living, even while she is into her second term in the Gram Panchayat. Like this passage from her story:

Quite far removed from the Kenchamma of 1993, who cried in humiliation as she returned from her first meetings, bewildered and frustated at not being able to say anything. We were walking through the village and my eyes fall on her callused hands. She points to the skin of betel nut strewn in piles every where. She did four sacks yesterday. At 50 rupees a box she makes 200 rupees for the day. ...An uneducated Dalit woman has done for her village what seasoned political aspirants have not. But what has she got in return? What does one make of this strange sort of limbo? Thins have changed so much over one generation – from Cariappa’s to his daughter-in-law’s, yet they remain disturbingly unchanged.

Kenchamma has been president of the panchayat twice and is now a grudgingly respected member of the village community – respected by Dailts and Lingayats. But she is still a poor Dalit woman. As if being any other way would be improper. Improper not to live in a thatched, leaking mud hut, or to plaster her house, to not struggle for daily wages, improper to imagine other livelihoods, work not just for the village but make a career out of governance and use the 10 years of hands-on learning she has had. The boundaries have been pushed, but still only from the limits of the home to the village. Isn’t it enough that you have been allowed to reach this far, the voices seem to suggest?

I think that Kenchammas of this world are wise, they know that entrenched social hierarchies can react back with terrible fury if they feel that the status quo is being challenged. They know that they can not count on any one else to protect them. So they bide their time, they accept to continue to living lives of poverty and marginalisation, even while achieving small changes, providing education for their children. They are not aiming for revolutions, they are aiming for a change. Most of us from worlds far away from theirs, including many development experts, are frustrated with this path of slow change.

Perhaps we, or some of us, would have preferred revolutions?

I would recommend this book to everyone, especially those who think that they know India, that they are building the modern new India, that they are bringing in the progress. It would bring a sense of balance in what they think about themselves and gain some respect for those Kanchammas, working in far away places to bring small changes in rural India, taking personal risks that most of us wouldn't have the courage to take.

Violence of Language

I had seen the Colombian writer, Efraim Medina Reyes in Ferrara, a couple of months ago. He had been in a round table with Arundhati Roy, Gofredo Fofi, Elif Shafaq and Laila Lalami. He might have been a good writer but he did not seem to be a very good speaker to me at that time. Or perhaps when he had spoken I was tired and distracted, I don’t know.

I had written about that meeting in this blog in October 2007.

What ever the reason, after the meeting from that particular session he was the only writer about whom I was unable to remember anything significant from his speech and that had made me feel a little guilty.

Yesterday I saw an article by him in an Italian magazine, Internazionale. “Il sesso forte”, the stronger sex. The article was apparently about the violence against women. I started reading it and just the first few lines made me sit up. Perhaps I had understood wrongly, I had thought and reread those lines. No, he had actually written what I had thought he had written. The article started thus:

Men kill each other for a variety of reasons. Most of all in their hunger for power and money. Yet, behind every war and aspiration for peace, there is always a soft and hairy cunt.

It was this last part of the phrase that had shaken me awake. Internazionale is an intellectual kind of magazine and though in Italian language people do tend to use equivalent words of fuck, prick and cunt much more liberally than in many other languages, this magazine is considered to be a little on the serious side for that. Thus if they have to use words like that they would use equivalents of making sex, penis and vagina, rather than their more popular counterparts.

I felt that the particular phrase in Medina’s article’s had been put in that particular way to shock the reader. As I read further, it was clear that the whole article was written to shock. It does not mince words and uses the words cunt, supercunt, gang bangs and rapes abundantly.

What is there to get shocked, you might well ask. Don’t we all use these words in other contexts? It was this undercurrent of violence that I felt in Medina’s words that disturbed me since apparently he is talking against violence in the world, about violence that especially targets women. Yet even while speaking against violence, he is expresses himself in very violent terms, I felt. For example, look at this part of his article (my translation from Italian):

We men can not imagine how terrible it can be for a woman to be forced to have sex. There are still some who think that when a woman refuses to share her cunt with them, actually she is just trying to provoke them. It must be clear that when a woman says no, it means no and you must forget it. I know it is not easy and it must have happened to everyone. But before letting yourself be obsessed by the cunt that has been negated to you, it is better to think of all others that are waiting for you with a smile.

So I had the feeling that he is writing something but his words are conveying exactly the opposite.

And then I was thinking about something else. In literature, in books and magazines, in our daily language, we are all becoming more open in the use of the swear words. In Italy we tend to use these words in way that they become ordinary words, they lose their taboo power. Parents use them in front of children and children use them in front of parents.

Even in some Indian books, magazines and films, it is the same thing. The written and depicted realities tend to reflect the real world in use of these words.

In a way I understand this need. Our bodies and sexuality in general has been too long hidden behind taboos, embarrassments and silences and it is good that those walls can be broken down and we can speak about these parts of our lives more openly. Yet I have a feeling, Medina’s use of the language is not the answer, that makes our body parts mere objects. Sex is not just a mechanics of penetrations and movements. Or does such language actually help us in breaking those barriers?