Persons in News

Shaktikanta Das has been appointed the new governor of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) a day after Urjit Patel stepped down from the position. Das, 61, is former finance secretary and currently a member of the federal finance commission, and one of India’s serving G20 representatives. Das supported demonetization and he was very visible and vocal bureaucrat to support PM Narendra Modi’s withdrawal of the high-value banknotes in 2016. He was also criticized by many for his pro-demonitisation stance. Earlier when Raghuram Rajan relinquished as Governor of the RBI, he was being perceived as one of the top contenders for the same, but Urjit Patel was selected for the top job.

Shaktikanta Das is a retired 1980 batch Indian Administrative Service officer of Tamil Nadu cadre. A former economic affairs secretary from 2015 to 2017, Das worked closely with the central bank. He is currently a member of the 15th Finance Commission of India, and the government’s representative at the Group of 20 summits.

It is gratifying to hear that Pakistan considers Bhagat Singh a shared hero. While there has always been popular support for him among the people in Pakistan, what is refreshing now is to have a meeting headed by the Chief Secretary of Pakistan’s Punjab province call him a “hero of both India and Pakistan”.

A special man

This is also a crucial moment to think about the possibility of projecting him as a shared hero in the midst of divisive politics, with narrow jingoistic nationalism overtaking everything else. It happened in Pakistan decades ago and now India seems to be following this destructive model. What’s there in Bhagat Singh that can bring India and Pakistan together? Is it his ultimate martyrdom or something more that recommends him as a common hero?

There are a few distinctive attributes in the persona of Bhagat Singh which make him acceptable crossing the limits of nationality, religion and culture. However, I will lay emphasis on his distinctive political and social ideals, which he espoused in his short but eventful life.

Singh is probably the only one from amongst our freedom struggle heroes who can be celebrated by both India and Pakistan. It is possibly because he stood for a non-sectarian and egalitarian world. He never espoused any divisive idea in his short life. And it is possible to make sense of his politics because he left behind a substantial written legacy to engage with. It is rare to find a young man in his early twenties developing the idea of universal brotherhood and articulating it in a detailed article. He imagined a world, in 1924, where “all of us being one and none is the other. It will really be a comforting time when the world will have no strangers.” Singh could imagine such a world several decades ago, while today some of us are busy othering our own people. We do that using the pretext of religion, caste, language or culture. He can be our hero only if we care to go along with his vision where he stressed that we need to “start believing that we all are born equal and our vocation, as well, need not divide us. If someone is born in a sweeper’s family that does not mean that he/she has to continue in the family profession cleaning **** all his life, with no right to participate in any developmental work”.

Singh continued with the same spirit and went on to say something which should be remembered by all in India and Pakistan, if at all we accept him as our shared hero. He emphatically exclaimed: “As long as the words like black and white, civilized and uncivilized, ruler and the ruled, rich and poor, touchable and untouchable, etc. are in vogue where is the scope for universal brotherhood? This can only be preached by free people. The slave India cannot refer to it.” He goes further to appeal, “We will have to campaign for equality and equity. Will have to punish those who oppose the creation of such a world.”

We in India mostly look up to Singh as a nationalist and a martyr, which is true but not enough. If Pakistanis also call him as their hero of the freedom struggle then he surely must be more than a territorial nationalist. He was a nationalist who stood for the freedom of all oppressed communities across the colonised world. He also vouched for a non-sectarian and inclusive nationalism which shall not discriminate on religious or any other ground. Both India and Pakistan need to ponder over Singh’s revolutionary vision, if they sincerely venerate him as a shared hero.

Squaring with reality

There is a large section of people in Pakistan who seem to be inspired by Singh’s ideals, but if the state calls him a shared hero, then it should be reflected in its politics. Sadly, both countries are far away from his vision, and Pakistan in particular is terribly antithetical to his ideals of egalitarianism, pluralism and non-sectarian governance. While commenting on the role of the press, Singh spoke his mind about rising communalism and skewed nationalism, which sounds so contemporaneous: “The real duty of the newspapers is to educate, to cleanse the minds of people, to save them from narrow sectarian divisiveness, and to eradicate communal feelings to promote the idea of common nationalism. Instead, their main objective seems to be spreading ignorance, preaching and propagating sectarianism and chauvinism, communalising people’s minds leading to the destruction of our composite culture and shared heritage.”

We can’t fabricate history to suit our present political concerns, the past can surely be interpreted on the basis of facts and not just fantasies to construct a “new India” or a “new Pakistan”.

1. Irfan Habib is a historian based in New Delhi

Stephen Hawking, a theoretical physicist and author of bestselling books died on 14^th March (2018) at his home in Cambridge. He was 76.

                     Stephen Hawking did research on general relativity and black holes. He wrote several popular science books including A Brief History of Time. In 1963, at the age of 22 Prof Hawking was diagnosed with a rare form of motor neuron disease, which left him in a wheelchair and largely unable to speak except through a voice synthesiser.

                Prof Hawking was the first to set out a theory of cosmology as a union of relativity and quantum mechanics. He also discovered that black holes leak energy and fade to nothing – a phenomenon that would later become known as Hawking radiation. In his work with mathematician Roger Penrose, he demonstrated that Einstein’s general theory of relativity implies space and time would have a beginning in the Big Bang and an end in black holes.

         Hawking recognised the great opportunities that arose from advances in artificial intelligence, but also warned about the dangers. He said that the primitive forms of artificial intelligence developed so far had already proved very useful; indeed, the tech he used to communicate incorporated a basic form of AI. But he feared the consequences of advanced forms of machine intelligence that could match or surpass humans.

         His book ‘A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes’ published in 1988 and sold more than ten million copies. His life story was the basis of an Academy Award winning 2014 film ‘The Theory of Everything’.

She was special. She was an icon, an apostle of courage, honesty and justice. She was an inspiration. She has faded leaving her mark on the posterity to think beyond self and act on real ground to fight injustice.   Asma Jehangir passed away on February 11, 2017 at the age of 66 due to a cardiac arrest in Lahore Pakistan’s top lawyer who was more known as human rights activist. Asma was bold and courageous and she lived her life fighting against authoritarianism and abuse of law by the powerful. She was Pakistan’s symbol of resistance and a human rights activist who spoke against military dictators and abusers of law for the past five decades. She headed the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan and remained the Supreme Court Bar Association chairperson. She was also appointed as UN Rapporteur in the region during the 1990s. She remained in jail during the dictatorial rule of General Zia-ul Haq in 1983 for raising her voice for the democrats.

Born and raised in Lahore, Jehangir studied at the Convent of Jesus and Mary before receiving her B.A from Kinnaird and LLB from the Punjab University in 1978. In 1980, Jahangir was called to the Lahore High Court and to the Supreme Court in 1982. In the 1980s, Jahangir became an democracy activist and was imprisoned in 1983 for participating in the Movement for the Restoration of Democracy against the military regime of Zia-ul-Haq. In 1986, she moved to Geneva, and became the vice-chair of the Defence for Children International and remained until 1988 when she moved back to Pakistan. In 1987 she co-founded the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan and became its Secretary General until 1993 when she was elevated as commission’s chairperson. She was again put under house arrest in November 2007 after the imposition of emergency. After serving as one of the leaders of the Lawyers’ Movement, she became Pakistan’s first woman to serve as the President of Supreme Court Bar Association of Pakistan.She has co-chaired South Asia Forum for Human Rights and was the vice president of International Federation for Human Rights.

Jehangir served as the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion from August 2004 to July 2010, including serving on the U.N. panel for inquiry into Sri Lankan human rights violations and on a fact-finding mission on Israeli settlements.She won numerous national and international awards for her struggle for the oppressed. The awrds she won include the 2014 Right Livelihood Award (along with Edward Snowden), 2010 Freedom Award, Hilal-i-Imtiaz in 2010, Sitara-i-Imtiaz, Ramon Magsaysay Award, 1995 Martin Ennals Award for Human Rights Defenders, and the UNESCO/Bilbao Prize for the Promotion of a Culture of Human Rights. She was awarded an Officier de la Légion d’honneur by France. Her prominent writings include The Hudood Ordinance: A Divine Sanction? and Children of a Lesser God.

Condolences poured in as soon as the news of her death came. Condolences poured in from within and outside the country. Leaders of all political parties paid rich tributes to her. Foreign Minister of Pakistan’sForeign Minister Khwaja M Asif said in his tweet, “ What a brave woman.Pakistan poorer without her. People like Asma are anchors of a society.The brave and dedicated daughter of a brave father.After 3 generations of camaraderie between our families,this is a deep personal loss. God bless her soul.” Nobel Prize winner brave girl from Pakistan, Malala, now pursuing her studies in Oxford tweeted, “Heartbroken that we lost Asma Jahangir – a saviour of democracy and human rights.” Former cricketer and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf leader Imran Khan tweeted, “Asma Jehangir’s death is a loss of a strong voice for the marginalised and oppressed. Despite our differences I always respected her for her fight for human rights and for standing up for her convictions.”Indian actress Nandita Das expressed her condolence saying Deeply shocked & saddened to hear of #AsmaJahangir. She was a true defender of #HumanRights #Democracy & fought till her last breath against authoritarian power, orthodoxy & discriminatn. She was & will remain an inspiration. A huge loss!

The people in power were not very comfortable with Asma Jehangir’s activism. General Musharraf openly expressed his hate for Asma Jehangir for raising her voice against missing persons often picked up by the intelligence agencies and never produced before the courts. She took up cases of dozens of missing persons and fought in the courts for their recovery free of cost. She was a vocal advocate for peace between Pakistan and India. Asma was often criticised by right wingers for her stance towards freedom of speech and against the use of religion to curb progressive voices. Asma also criticised the judiciary for not giving justice to the oppressed and not taking notice of extra judicial killings and abductions.

Asma Jehangir, the Iron Lady of Pakistan has bid adieu. But her voice for freedom and justice would keep on reverberating in the ears of the posterity inspiring and motivating to continue the fight for a freer, just and better world. South Asia is proud of this daughter from Pakistan and she would always remain alive in the minds of people, especially when they need a reason to hope that howsoever difficult it is , the fight for justice and freedom is worth, no matter what it takes!

Senior journalist Gauri Lankesh, an outspoken critic of Hindutva politics, was shot dead in Bengaluru on Tuesday. Karnataka police chief R K Dutta said Lankesh was shot dead by unidentified assailants at the entrance of her residence in Rajrajeshwari Nagar. Lankesh, in her 50s, edited a Kannada tabloid Gauri Lankesh Patrike besides owning some other publications. Dutta said Lankesh had not voiced apprehension about any threat to her life during a couple of meetings he had with her. Asked about who could be the possible suspects in the killing, the officer refused to hazard any guess, saying “let the investigation proceed first.” Karnataka Home Minister Ramalinga Reddy condemned the incident, calling it unfortunate.

Lankesh was convicted in a defamation case filed by Bharatiya Janata Party MP Prahlad Joshi over a report published in her tabloid against some saffron party leaders. Several people in media and public life took to twitter to express shock at Lankesh’s killing.”As a friend, colleague & admirer for decades shocked & shattered to hear of the murder of Gauri Lankesh, one of India’s gutsiest journalists,” said Vir Sanghvi, an eminent media personality.

“If it is BJP ruled state, Liberals would have cried for emergency, Intolerance, Fascism,” tweeted National Conference leader and former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah. Lawyer-activist Prashant Bhushan tweeted: “Shocking & tragic! Brave journalist Gauri Lankesh who exposed the BJP has been shot dead in her home in Bangalore!

Economist Dr. Rajiv Kumar has been appointed (August 5, 2017) as the new Vice-Chairman of the government think tank NITI Aayog. Present vice-chairman Arvind Panagariya had stepped down earlier this month. The Columbia University professor will be returning to the U.S. to rejoin academia.  Dr. Vinod Paul, pediatrician at AIIMS, has also been appointed as a member of the NITI Aayog.

Dr. Rajiv Kumar, who holds a DPhil in economics from Oxford and a Ph.D from Lucknow University, has served as director and chief executive of the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER), and has earlier worked with the Asian Development Bank. He was also a senior fellow at the Centre for Policy Research. He has written a book titled Modi and His Challenges. In chapter 2  of the book titled “Ideals, Ideology and Influences” , he has dealt with the period before Narendra Modi became chief minister of Gujarat. This doesn’t have material that is new or unknown and draws extensively on earlier books by M V Kamath and Kalindi Randeri, Andy Marino, Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay, Sudesh Verma and Madhu Kishwar. Having immersed himself in these biographies, Mr Kumar gives us the core biographic details and lists 14 “principle [sic] drivers of Modi’s behavior”. He adds, “It will be interesting to examine if some of the traits enumerated have found their expression in Modi’s administration over 12 years in Gujarat”. In chapter 3,  he has examined the Gujarat model. At one place he hasexpressed surprise why Modi has , for some mysterious reasons, consciously dispensed with the prime minister’s economic advisory council; abolished also the national manufacturing competitiveness council; not appointed a professional economist in the PMO, as also not a media adviser; and also replaced the erstwhile planning commission with a rather sharply-pruned reincarnation in the form of NITI Aayog [sic]…There might be merit in having regular access to a variety of opinions and inputs, especially when one is on a learning curve. He has in his interviews with media emphasized the need for growth of the manufacturing sector, employment creation to take advantage of demographic dividend and skill formation as important challenges in front of Modi government.