Indian Press On Blaming The Woman For Her Travails, Different Perceptions of Anti-CAA And Farmers' Agitations, Hindu Consolidation Against Muslims And Assault On US Capitol: New Age Islam's Selection, 19 January 2021
By New Age Islam Edit
Desk
19 January
2021
• Quintessential Misogynist Views; Blame The
Woman For Her Travails
By N.C. Asthana
• Why
The Anti-CAA And Farmers' Agitations Have Been Perceived Differently
By Ajay Gudavarthy
• Hindu Consolidation Against Muslims Is The
Political Equivalent In India For The American Call, Open Or Subtle, For White
Supremacy
By Rajmohan Gandhi
• Decoding India’s Move In Kabul
By Avinash Paliwal
• Assault On US Capitol Was Based On White
Supremacist Beliefs That Has Marked Trump’s Politics
By Sanjib Baruah
• Biden Moment Offers Delhi An Opportunity To
Elevate Defence Cooperation To A Higher Level
By C. Raja Mohan
• Thoughts On Democracy As Trump Exits,
Finally…
By Sunanda K Datta Ray
----
Quintessential Misogynist Views; Blame The
Woman For Her Travails
By N.C. Asthana
19 January
2021
Representative image. Photo:
Reuters/B Mathur
-----
Recently,
Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan suggested that the age of
marriage for women be increased. On August 15, 2020, Prime Minister Narendra
Modi in his speech announced that the Central government had set up a committee
and a task force to examine the possibility of increasing the age of marriage
for women from the present 18 years to 21 years.
Chouhan
also said a new system would be put in place, under which any woman moving out
of her house for her work will register herself at the local police station,
and she will be tracked for her safety. A helpline number will be provided to
such women, enabling them to call for help in case of distress. The
installation of panic buttons in public transportation will be made compulsory.
The minimum
age of marriage as 18 years for women and 21 years for men was prescribed by
the 1978 amendment to the Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1929 (popularly known
as the Sarda Act), essentially to curb child marriages and consequent sexual or
other abuse of children.
Before the
amendment, it was 16 and 18 years for women and men, respectively. Section 5
(iii) of The Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 and the Special Marriage Act, 1954
conform to this amendment, whereas, in Islam, the marriage of a minor who has
attained puberty (defined as 15 years in the case of Muhammad Ibrahim Rashid vs
Atkia Begum and Anr.) is considered valid. The Supreme Court has yet to clarify
its position on this vis-à-vis the Sarda Act.
The
scientific argument
Early
pregnancy is generally believed to be associated with increased infant
mortality rate (IMR) and maternal mortality rate (MMR), etc. However, as most
readers would be surprised to learn, how early is “really early” has not been
scientifically determined.
A
comprehensive study by the National Research Council (US) Panel on Adolescent
Sexuality, Pregnancy and Childbearing involving as many as 53,625 subjects
debunks popular ‘governmental’ notions. “Although a relationship between an
early first birth and the child’s health at birth has been found, this appears
to be a result of less than adequate prenatal and perinatal care rather than
biology, since it appears to disappear in special hospital populations that
receive excellent health care.”
An
International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) study of adolescent
pregnancies in Bangladesh had also found child health to be linked to poverty
and malnutrition.
Now, if a
girl is malnourished before marriage because of poverty and/or gender-based
discrimination in her family, she is likely to remain so after marriage also,
unless she happens to get married into a family with greatly different economic
status and values, irrespective of her age at the time of marriage.
This means
that while there may be valid social reasons to fix a minimum legal age of marriage,
from a scientific point of view, it is essentially arbitrary in character.
The logic
of economic maturity
Marriage
requires three kinds of maturities: biological, psychological and economic. We
have already addressed the issue of biological maturity.
As for
psychological maturity, if boys and girls of 18 years of age are mature enough
to elect the leaders of their country on which the future of millions depends,
they must be mature enough to address the issues of their families too on which
the future of only a few people depends. Otherwise, the inevitable conclusion
will be that voting age had been lowered deliberately to exploit the
gullibility of the youth.
That leaves
us with the question of the age of economic maturity, which is directly linked with
education.
In its
Educational Statistics at a Glance, the government itself maintains that on an
average, they expect children to finish their senior secondary education (Class
IX-X) by 17 years, and higher education by 23 years of age.
The dropout
rate for boys and girls at the secondary level (14-15 years) is 20.4% and
19.2%, respectively. Among boys, the dropouts have to enter the job market
anyway, even if the pay and growth prospects of their educational level are
poor. The job prospects for a child with even senior secondary education (Class
XI-XII) are also poor.
This means
that economically, they would remain in a bad shape even after attaining 21
years of age. Given the high unemployment rate in the country, even if they
marry after 21 years of age, they are likely to continue depending partly on
their parents. Thus, there is little to believe that our youth become
economically mature by the prescribed minimum age of marriage.
And, trying
to link age of marriage with marital rape is fatuous because this could happen
anytime, anywhere.
Governments
must not control private lives of people
A
government must govern, that is, concern itself with larger issues; it should
not start micromanaging the private lives of the people or encroach upon their freedom.
For a
social issue like child marriage with girls as young as four to seven years of
age, as it was prevalent in our country in the colonial era and earlier, the
government’s duty ended with making a point that it was inherently a bad thing
(malum in se) and hence needed to be outlawed.
However,
governments should not start dictating personal choices beyond a point. In Lata
Singh vs State of U.P. & Another (2006), the Supreme Court had held that
once a person became a major he or she could marry whosoever he/she liked. The
Karnataka high court recently reiterated it.
The
situation for every family is different and applying the same yardstick for all
of them is irrational. In a traditional business family, for example, if a boy
is not obliged to seek any job but will certainly take care of his family
business/shop, higher education is not relevant for him because his economic
security is guaranteed anyway.
If he
marries a girl who is not interested in pursuing higher education or working,
it does not matter even if both are married at 18. It is their choice, so be
it. On the other hand, there are boys without any family support who are able
to land a decent job only at the age of 30, marry at 32 and produce a child at
36.
Moreover,
“prescribing” different age of marriages for boys and girls is inherently
discriminatory and patriarchal in character. Since they complete their
education in the same age bracket, there is no reason to differentiate. In
2018, the Law Commission had also suggested making it 18 for both sexes and
argued that that the unequal age prescribed for marriage has no basis and it
“contributes to the stereotype that wives must be younger than their husbands.”
In view of
the above, there is no good reason for increasing the minimum legal age for
marriage for women from 18 to 21 years. While the Supreme Court has yet to
clarify on how can the Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1929 be reconciled with
the Muslim Personal Law, it is apprehended that the ultimate target of this
exercise could be the Muslim community and their bête noire, the Uniform Civil
Code.
Instead of
unnecessarily raking up fresh controversies, it would be better if the
government focused on enforcing the existing law to curb child marriages in
states like Rajasthan, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal.
The absurd
idea of ‘tracking working women’
A state
which fails to provide security to women by striking the fear of the law in the
minds of criminals and potential criminals keeps on indulging in such gimmicks
as face-saving devices. That the police’s top brass agreed to such a
hare-brained idea is alarming.
First, in
the name of trying to provide security to women, they cannot commit an illegal
act. Asking a working woman to register at the local police station does not
have any sanction in law and is a blatant violation of her right to privacy.
For example, in the name of protecting women from domestic violence, the state
cannot deploy cops in their bedrooms!
Second, the
idea fails to understand the mechanics of crimes against women. Working women
are not the preferred target of sexual offenders.
Third,
given the myriad statutory commitments of the police and their limited
workforce, it is simply not feasible to keep track of so many working women.
Madhya Pradesh has just about 125 cops per lakh population against a national
average of 147 and a very high crime rate.
Fourth, how
would they do it, even if by some miracle, the scheme were held to be legally
valid? Can they waste the already stretched workforce to do it? There are no technical
means of doing it. They cannot use GPS monitors of the type they use in the US
for sex offenders, for that would be utterly illegal.
Fifth, in
spite of several apps like Himmat having been launched, their efficacy is yet
to be proven. There is little to believe that MP’s panic buttons and helpline
numbers would accomplish what the already existing systems could not.
This scheme
of the Madhya Pradesh government reflects their quintessential misogynist
views; blame the woman for her travails; blame her for everything she does; and
if nothing works, shackle her. The desire to keep a woman in her place is
commonly reflected in two things. The first is to restrict what she wears; the
second is to restrict her movements.
They want
that women should not be found at any place other than her home and workplace,
thereby imposing illegal restrictions on her. The ulterior motive of such an
idea is to blame the woman if anything untoward happens to her at any place,
which is not the shortest path connecting her place of work to her home. They
will say that she had “strayed” (indirectly casting aspersions on her
character) and hence she was subjected to a crime – so convenient!
------
N.C. Asthana, a retired IPS officer, has been
DGP Kerala and a long-time ADG CRPF and BSF. Views are personal.
https://thewire.in/government/madhya-pradesh-women-tracking-safety-marriage-age
------
Why the Anti-CAA and Farmers' Agitations Have
Been Perceived Differently
By Ajay Gudavarthy
19 January 2021
Farmers' protest and the anti-CAA
movement. Photo: Reuters Illustration: The Wire
-----
India has been witnessing street protests after the ‘awe and shock’ that the current regime pursued in its first few years during which mass protests were almost non-existent.
Beginning
with the students of various universities, lead by those in Jawaharlal Nehru
University (JNU) against fee hikes, and then followed by massive protests
against the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), we have seen mass action
accelerate. Neither of them, however, were able to push the Narendra Modi
government on to the backfoot as the current farmers’ movement has managed to.
It has forced the government into holding talks, which has not happened before.
Though the talks could merely be a delaying tactic, the farmers are also
playing along and using the optics to further expose the pro-corporate bias of
the BJP.
Initially,
the BJP tried the same tricks that it usually does. Speaking at cross purposes,
and then branding the farmers as Khalistanis and worse, the BJP tried to
undermine and ridicule them; none of this worked. Farmers have managed to gain
larger support from the society at large, including the urban middle classes.
In a sense, this is unprecedented. In Punjab, the support came from across
classes: film stars, bureaucrats and Sikh Diaspora. This gave the farmers’
movement a new moral valency.
The
narrative was about food security of India. It was not about Sikhs or Jats or
the interests of privileged farmers, but also farm workers who belong to the
Dalit community. Perhaps, the symbolism of being the annadata can only be
paralleled by Gandhi’s salt satyagraha, which utilised the symbolism of use of
salt across castes and classes. Today, the uniting symbolism is of farmers as
producers of food.
It has also
brought back the old binary of ‘Bharat versus India’, and it is very clear to
which side the government’s bias tilts. It appears that in the popular
consciousness, nationalism continues to have its original roots in the
country’s agrarian cultural ethos. One cannot be against the farmer and
pro-Bharat Mata. The BJP built its narrative on local cultural idiom but at the
same time, remained steadfastly pro-corporate. This combination worked as long
as the interests of the local did not directly clash with those of the big
corporates. Nationalist discourse could also not be turned against the farmers
as many of the soldiers on the front come from the same farming families. What
is even more intriguing was that the farmers did not hesitate to call for the
release of all political prisoners, including those arrested in the Bhima
Koregaon case.
Neither the
student protests nor the anti-CAA agitation could gain this kind of widespread
moral acceptability. The current regime did not hesitate to use force against
the students and anti-CAA activists in Jamia. A series of arrests followed but
there was less than anticipated public response against that action.
The larger
appeal of the farmers’ protest
While the
anti-CAA activists too drew on protecting democracy and constitution, it did
not evoke widespread sympathy and trust from the non-Muslim population. It
could well be argued that there has been sustained propaganda against the
Muslim community and with them being singled out, how could they produce a
discourse that has a larger appeal?
But is that
also not true of the farmers’ movement? That it was being led by Jat Sikhs from
Punjab? The government did try branding them as Khalistanis, and Sikhs too have
a history of demanding a separate nation, yet the regime did not succeed in
isolating them the way the anti-CAA protests got reduced to the question of
citizenship for the Muslims.
The
anti-CAA protests began with a wider agenda but got gradually reduced to the
issue of citizenship of the Muslims. The farmers’ movement, on the other hand,
began as an exclusive issue of the farmers and has expanded to include a range
of activists, including the Left unions, Dalits, women and other political
organisations. It looks likely that the farmers’ movement will reach out to even
larger social groups and will remain committed to their demands against the big
corporates.
Why is it
so that while larger and differentiated social groups and organisations are
able to read their demands alongside the farmers?
The
anti-CAA protests began to be perceived differently the moment Muslim women,
children and elderly were on the streets. Bilkis Dadi emerged as the face and
message of the movement, as did the elderly Sikh men out in the cold. One
cannot totally rule out latent anger or discomfort of the RSS-BJP combine with
a Sikh majority state and protest, but try as they did, the ruling dispensation
could not create a binary of “national and anti-national” or between Hindus and
Sikhs. What succeeded in the context of the anti-CAA protests did not in the
context of the Sikh farmers who are participating in the protest.
Farmers
refused to be read in the singular, while the anti-CAA movement failed to
prevent the protests from being read as those led by and for Muslims.
Singularity is always prone to be read in popular consciousness as closer to
sectarian claims. There are Muslims too in the farmers’ protest but they are
farmers first and Muslims later.
This does
leave us with the difficult question of Muslim identity and their legitimate
aspirations for representation. Such demands have to be forged in more
universal registers, alongside other social demands and in joining
organisations fighting for such demands. Minority Muslim politics needs to be
part of movements for universal education for all, in the fight for welfare
demands and work. In forging such demands, they do this as Muslims but also
stand for others and not Muslims alone.
If anti-CAA
protests were to be re-ignited after the pandemic, they may have to be
different in light of the farmers’ protest. It is in moving beyond this
singularity that the anti-CAA protests can avoid the isolation that is sought
to be imposed on the movement. This might provide us with a fresh opportunity
to reimagine minority politics in India.
---
Ajay Gudavarthy is an associate professor at
the Centre for Political Studies, JNU.
https://thewire.in/rights/farmers-protest-caa-movement-perception-bjp
----
Hindu Consolidation Against Muslims Is The
Political Equivalent In India For The American Call, Open Or Subtle, For White
Supremacy
By Rajmohan Gandhi
January 19,
2021
Important
American events were pushed off stage by videos of the hideous January 6 bid to
prevent the US Congress from certifying Biden’s victory. America’s response
will be watched with interest, but a focus on what was removed from view is
also called for.
Only an
hour or so before the Trump-incited attack occurred, Democrats had wrested
control of the US Senate: Their nominee, Jon Ossoff, was projected as the
winner in the final Georgia runoff. Then, a few hours after the attack, top
Republicans in the Senate openly broke with Trump. Enlisting most of their
party colleagues, they ensured certification.
Both
Kentucky’s Mitch McConnell, the Senate’s veteran leader, and South Carolina’s
Lindsey Graham, until that moment Trump’s most persuasive ally, told the Senate
that the Congress was obligated, by law and the facts, to certify Biden’s win.
Frontally
addressing Trump’s repeated falsehood that “thousands of dead men” and
“thousands of felons” had voted for Biden, Graham said he had asked to see just
10 Biden votes from dead men or criminals. He hadn’t been shown even one.
“Enough is
enough,” Graham shouted in videos anyone can access, “Joe Biden will be the
president and Kamala Harris the vice-president.” Possessing no role in auditing
the vote, the Senate did not need this assertion. But, bombarded by Trump’s
falsehoods, everyday Republicans across America required it.
For true
believers in Trump’s infallibility, men like Graham and McConnell no longer
matter. They merely join those who should be “hanged”, a list that already
includes vice-president Pence. However, frank reiteration of electoral facts
helps others who voted Republican to accept the result and move on.
Some
Republicans are starting to express another political fact: Their party cannot
expect to win future nationwide elections with only the white vote, which in
percentage terms is steadily shrinking. In many individual constituencies, on
the other hand, as also in several states taken as a whole, white supremacy
remains an appealing message, and one which can be conveyed without using
precise words.
Like most
other states of the American south, Georgia thus far was reliably “Red” (the
Republican colour). Currently, the state’s electorate is 52 per cent white, 32
per cent Black, 10 percent Latino and 4.4 percent Asian. Jon Ossoff, a Jew, and
Rev. Raphael Warnock, a Black preacher, defeated their Republican rivals
because a crucial slice of the white vote plus an overwhelming share of the
Black vote came to them.
Black
percentages are distinctly larger in the American South, which means that their
political future should be bright if, while retaining Black support, Democrats
can modestly widen their appeal among Whites and Latinos. Such a goal may not
be beyond reach for people like Warnock, Ossoff and Stacey Abrams, the
remarkable woman who has steadily bolstered Black voting and the Democratic
Party in Georgia.
The state
has other strengths. For 33 years until his death last July, John Lewis, the
civil rights hero possessing numerous white fans, represented a Georgia
constituency in Washington. His autobiography reveals that Lewis had closely
studied Gandhi and satyagraha in the 1950s and 1960s. Also closely connected to
Georgia and its largest city, Atlanta, were Martin Luther King Jr. and his
father. In fact, Warnock, the new senator, is the pastor at the Atlanta church
where “Daddy” King and his more famous son had both served.
In any
long-term contest in the US between white supremacy and what King saw as his
“beloved”, multiracial America, most observers would pick the latter to win.
Still, the attack on the Capitol exposed an ugly reality, which is that some or
many of the 74 million who voted for Trump (as against the 81 million for
Biden) believe that whites own America.
“This is
our house,” attackers told the police as they forced their way into the Capitol
with Confederate flags, Trump banners, guns, explosives, at least one noose,
and “Jesus” placards. Without their permission, Blacks and other non-Whites
should not enter or inhabit this house of theirs. Persons like Speaker Nancy
Pelosi were trespassers.
In India,
Muslims, Dalits and Adivasis, taken together, form the equivalent of America’s
Blacks. Counting Dalits and Adivasis in the Hindu fold, Hindu radicals reserve
their public ire for Muslims. “Hindu consolidation” against Muslims is the
political equivalent in India for the American call, open or subtle, for white
supremacy.
Who are the
Hindu leaders who will speak frankly to India’s cow vigilantes or “love jihad”
militants the way Pence, McConnell and Graham finally spoke on January 6 to
America’s Trump backers? If “enough is enough” will not escape the lips of a
Narendra Modi, an Amit Shah, an Adityanath or any principal colleague, everyday
Hindus must utter the words, in their homes to kith and kin, outside their
homes to fellow citizens.
“India
belongs as much to her Muslims, Sikhs, Christians, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis,
Jews, atheists or others as to her Hindus.” With such words, Gandhi, Nehru and
Ambedkar inspired free India to commence an impressive journey. Hindus unable
or unwilling today to utter these words are India’s counterparts of the
enablers of the January 6 attack on America’s core and constitutional meaning.
But Kamala
Harris, Raphael Warnock, Jon Ossoff and Stacey Abrams too have their Indian
counterparts: Leaders from minority communities, and weaker castes, who feel
connected also to other Indians, including caste Hindus and high-caste Hindus.
When their voices ring out without fear, as also the voices of everyday Hindus
offended by the coerciveness of Hindu supremacy, Indian Trumpism will find its
nemesis.
https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/indias-victory-against-divisive-politics-will-come-when-everyday-hindus-say-enough-7151952/
-----
Decoding India’s Move In Kabul
By Avinash Paliwal
JAN 19,
2021
India’s
powerful national security adviser, Ajit Doval, undertook a long-overdue visit
to Kabul last week. It took place soon after external affairs minister S
Jaishankar promised more military support to Afghanistan. Though the specifics
of such support are unclear, whatever India offers is unlikely to tilt the
military balance in Kabul’s favour after the withdrawal of the United States
(US). Why, then, is India opting to intensify support for the Afghan government
when the world is hedging its bets and engaging with the Taliban?
With
negotiations between Kabul and the Taliban in Doha gridlocked, intensification
of fighting on the ground, including targeted assassinations of civilians,
flourishing factionalism within Kabul, lack of clarity on how US
President-elect Joe Biden will proceed with the withdrawal, and an assertive
Pakistan, the main question facing India is how long can President Ashraf Ghani
withstand these pressures, and what next?
The central
driver of India’s Afghanistan policy is its desire to ensure a strategic
balance between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Given the power asymmetry between
these two countries, such a balance, from an Indian viewpoint, then, is to
enable Kabul to influence the terms of talks with Pakistan-supported forces
such as the Taliban. To that effect, New Delhi has found determined, if
embattled, allies in Ghani and Vice-President Amrullah Saleh.
But there
is no guarantee that New Delhi’s approach will yield results. In fact, given
India’s mounting security challenges with both Pakistan and China, there are
valid concerns about India losing ground entirely if Kabul collapses. So why
intensify support for Kabul even if India is unwilling to overtly engage with
the Taliban? After all, there is no need to bind itself further to the Ghani
government. History offers clues to better understand India’s decision.
In February
1989, Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi dispatched AK Verma, the then chief of
India’s external intelligence agency, Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW), to
assess the longevity of the Najibullah government, which was under pressure
from Mujahideen attacks. Verma returned upbeat and said Najibullah can last “indefinitely”
with Soviet support. Parallel to Verma’s visit, India had begun outreach to
different Mujahideen factions and found a surprising convergence of interest.
Successful
outreach to the Mujahideen, hidden from public view and held anathema till that
moment, helped India embrace the new realities after Najibullah’s ouster in
1992 when Soviet support ended. For now, there is no evidence that India’s
unofficial outreach to the Taliban and vice-versa has generated an
understanding of that sort. But even if such an understanding exists, it is
unlikely to be made public by either side — similar to what happened with the
Mujahideen.
Overt
engagement with India will complicate the Taliban’s relations with Pakistan
when it can least afford this. For India, overt diversification risks
expediting Ghani’s political collapse instead of ensuring an internal balance
within Afghanistan. Both New Delhi and the Taliban know that they can’t remain
aloof forever, especially if the latter comes to power. India’s decision to support
Ghani, then, is a sign that there are no endgames for India in Afghanistan.
Thus, it would rather accept a setback in its pursuit of a balance between
Kabul and Islamabad and securing the few gains that Afghanistan has made over
the last two decades, instead of coming across as an opportunistic.
The other
aspect of India’s decision has a sharper edge. On August 15, 1975, India
received a strategic shock in the form Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s assassination in
Bangladesh. The rise of the pro-Pakistan army chief Ziaur Rahman as president
in Dhaka generated tremendous anxiety in New Delhi. In a now-declassified
top-secret report, R&AW assessed that Pakistan would “exercise a pervasive
influence in various ministries and departments of the Govt of Bangla Desh, especially
in the foreign office [and] … would widen the differences between India and
Bangla Desh”.
In response
(in first of its kind archival evidence seen by this author), R&AW
recommended that the political leadership take all feasible measure to “soften
up areas which are contiguous to Indian territories where we are especially
vulnerable” and sought re-appraisal of relations with Pakistan. As a first
step, it wanted Indira Gandhi to seriously consider the “idea of providing
strong support to anti-Pakistani activities in NWFP, and Baluchistan now being
carried on from bases in Afghanistan”. To relieve Pakistani pressure on India
through Bangladesh, R&AW thought it was necessary “to intensify pressure on
Pakistan through Afghanistan”.
Given
India’s security challenges today, it is entirely possible that Doval’s visit
is a signal to Pakistan that the latter is likely to inherit a costly, violent,
and ultimately digressionary mess in Afghanistan if it continues to pursue
revisionism. Such signalling is buttressed by India’s belief that even if the
US leaves lock stock and barrel, neither Iran nor Russia, despite their
alliance with China and engagement with the Taliban, would prefer an Islamic
Emirate in Afghanistan — offering India space to manoeuvre, and influence the
outcome of the Afghan war(s) over the next six-to-12 months.
Saleh’s
unsubtle tweet: “Had a pleasant meeting with NSA Ajit Doval of India. We
discussed the enemy. It was an in-depth discussion”, therefore, must be read
for what it is, ie, a real, continuing, challenge to Pakistan.
-----
Avinash Paliwal teaches at SOAS, University of
London and is the author of My Enemy’s Enemy: India in Afghanistan from the
Soviet Invasion to the US Withdrawal.
https://www.hindustantimes.com/opinion/decoding-india-s-move-in-kabul-101610974153284.html
------
Assault On US Capitol Was Based On White
Supremacist Beliefs That Has Marked Trump’s Politics
By Sanjib Baruah
January 18,
2021
With the
approval of the impeachment resolution by the US House of Representatives last
Wednesday, Donald Trump became the first president in American history to be
impeached twice. But since the Senate is not scheduled to meet till January 19
— the day before President-elect Joe Biden is inaugurated — the impeachment will
not cut short Trump’s term in office. Its effects will be mostly symbolic. But
Senate action on the resolution even after he leaves office could disqualify
him from the presidency and preclude another presidential run.
The charge
made against President Trump in the impeachment resolution is mind-boggling —
the incitement of insurrection. The resolution refers to the false statements
that he has made repeatedly about widespread voter fraud in the 2020
presidential elections and the suggestion that the results “should not be
accepted by the American people or certified by State or Federal officials”,
and to his role in encouraging the January 6 siege of the Capitol.
On that
day, Trump told his supporters that “we won this election, and we won it by a
landslide”. There is no evidence to back his claim; multiple legal challenges
to the election results in various states had failed for lack of credible
evidence. He encouraged his supporters to “walk down to the Capitol”, falsely
suggesting that the election results could still be overturned by the Congress,
which was meeting that day for ceremonially counting the Electoral College
votes and certifying the winner. But the Senate majority leader Senator Mitch
McConnell — a staunch Trump ally till recently — reminded his colleagues that
the constitution gave Congress only a limited role. Since the “voters, courts,
states have all spoken”, overruling them would “damage our republic forever”.
There is
little doubt that the angry mobs at the Capitol posed a direct threat to the
lives of elected representatives — especially those demonised by Trump. Quite a
few of the Trump loyalists wore military uniforms and were armed — members of
neo-fascist and white supremacist groups such as the Proud Boys. It is hard not
to see the siege of the Capitol as an act of insurrection incited by a sitting
president and a stunning assault on American democracy.
Trump’s
base is, of course, convinced that there was widespread voter fraud in the
elections. The narrative of a stolen election has a racial subtext that has
long roots in American history. The focus of his allegations is the so-called
“Democrat-run cities” of Philadelphia, Detroit, Milwaukee and Atlanta, where
African-Americans constitute a majority or a plurality. They overwhelmingly
voted Democratic tipping the balance for Biden in those battleground states —
Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and Georgia. “Democrat-run cities, like
Detroit and Philadelphia, two of the most politically corrupt places in
America”, he said in a Facebook post, “cannot be responsible for deciding the
outcome of this race”. The terms “Democrat-run” and “politically corrupt” are
codewords for Black areas. The notion that it is illegitimate for the outcome
of the presidential election to be decided by cities with large
African-American populations resonates with America’s dismal history of
opposition to Black suffrage.
An explicit
appeal to racial resentment has been the foundation of Trump’s support among
the white working class. It was by embracing the fringe conspiracy theory that
Barack Obama was born in Kenya and thus ineligible to serve as president that
Trump first made a mark among the largely white base of the Republican Party.
It was a way of challenging the legitimacy of America’s first Black president
without using overtly racist language. Many of Trump’s decisions on admission
into the country by foreigners — the border wall, the travel bans, cuts in
legal immigration, limiting refugee admissions, immigration-enforcement raids,
family-splitting deportations, crackdown on sanctuary cities and pushing back
asylum seekers — to use the words of political analyst Ronald Brownstein,
“preponderantly tilted toward the white voters most hostile to immigration and
most uneasy about demographic change overall”.
The
Capitol-storming Trump supporters were overwhelmingly white. Pictures and
videos taken during the siege and shared on social media have received much
attention. The restraint and amiability of some police officers towards the
intruders surprised many. In a widely circulated image, a police officer posed
for a selfie with a protester. There were also shots of police officers
politely escorting rioters out of the building. The Capitol Police has been
criticised for failing to anticipate the breach and the potential for violence
despite the fact that Trump supporters openly discussed their plans on online
forums.
The
contrast with the police response to the Black Lives Matter protests last
summer couldn’t be more revealing. Had Black and brown BLM protesters tried to
enter the Capitol instead of predominantly white Trump supporters, says
Washington D.C. area BLM organiser Anthony Lorenzo Green, “we would be
shackled, we would be carried away, we would be shot, we would be dead”.
President-elect
Biden has promised to appoint “the single most diverse Cabinet based on race,
colour, based on gender, that’s ever existed in the United States of America”.
He is on track to deliver on that promise. Biden introduced his nominees to
lead the Justice Department at a press conference held a day after the siege of
the Capitol. The nominees for the three top positions at the Justice Department
below the attorney general are women. If confirmed by the Senate,
Indian-American civil rights lawyer Vanita Gupta will be the first woman of
colour to serve as associate attorney general.
It is
likely that while half of America will welcome Biden’s choices and his decision
as a sign of social progress, the other half will take a dim view of it. If
Trump’s 2016 election victory was partly the result of a racial backlash
against the Obama presidency, Biden’s public embrace of diversity and inclusion
is sure to reinforce white resentment and disaffection. Unfortunately, such
emotions, says African-American scholar Carol Anderson, author of White Rage:
The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide, have “long thrived on the fantasy of
being under siege and having to fight back”.
https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/donald-trump-capitol-hill-us-elections-7150398/
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Biden Moment Offers Delhi An Opportunity To
Elevate Defence Cooperation To A Higher Level
By C. Raja Mohan
January 19,
2021
Any idea or
policy associated with Donald Trump might be too toxic for the political class
in Washington, at least for some time, after the failed insurrection incited by
Trump earlier this month and his impeachment in the Congress a few days later.
But one idea that defined Trump’s worldview — putting “America First” — has
already had a considerable impact on the agenda of his successor, Joe Biden.
Understanding this continuity could help India productively engage with the new
American administration.
Immediately
after he is sworn in amidst unprecedented security arrangements in Washington
on Wednesday, Biden is expected to issue a series of executive orders (much
like our ordinances) in a decisive break from the Trump era. The new
President’s decrees are expected to take the US back to the 2015 Paris
Agreement on mitigating climate change, reverse some of Trump’s sweeping
restrictions on immigration, extend pandemic-related limits on evictions and
student debt payment, and make it mandatory for everyone to wear a mask on
federal government properties.
At the same
time, Biden is expected to reaffirm an important theme in his inaugural address
— that he will reunite the nation and redress the multiple economic and
political challenges confronting the US. Throughout his campaign, which took
place amidst the devastating impact of the COVID crisis, and in his victory
speech after the election results came in the first week of November, Biden
stuck to one important political message — “to restore the soul of America” and
“rebuild the backbone of the nation, the middle class”.
At its
core, Biden’s emphasis on the middle class is not very different from Trump’s
emphasis on America First. It is not a term that Biden will use, given the
historic political baggage associated with it. For the internationalist
establishment, “America First” has come to represent the negative forces of
narrow nationalism, isolationism, and populism. But Joe Biden and his team have
been smart enough to recognise the enormous political appeal it has acquired in
recent years and prepare to address its consequences effectively. America’s key
interlocutors will be wise to see this important common thread running from
Trump to Biden. To be sure, there will be much difference in the style between
the two leaders and major differences on policy issues like climate change and
immigration, but both Trump and Biden are under pressure to reorient American
foreign policy in response to changing domestic imperatives.
Trump
challenged the traditional notions of America’s global leadership,
international military interventions, and the pursuit of free trade and
globalisation. If Trump’s contestation of the traditional American post-war
foreign policy was crude and chaotic, the Biden team is making a more
sophisticated case for change in the way America deals with the world.
The new
approach to foreign policy was articulated most consistently over the last year
and more by Jake Sullivan, one of Biden’s closest associates, who has been
designated as the new national security adviser. A report issued by
Washington’s Carnegie Endowment for International Peace last fall, which was
co-authored by Sullivan, gives some insights into the thinking that has gone
into making Biden a champion of the American middle class. Titled “Making US
Foreign Policy Work Better for the Middle Class”, the report notes the
deepening economic anxiety and discontent in the American heartland. It
underlines the proposition that trade liberalisation has not worked for
everyone in the US. This is not very different from Trump’s view on free trade.
But unlike
Trump, the report suggests that trade is only one part of the problem. It calls
for policies to address the deepening income inequality at home and a domestic
investment and industrial strategy that will allow America to become more
competitive in the world.
The report
also points to the overreach of American foreign policy in recent decades and
proposes a “less ambitious” foreign policy. The Carnegie report notes that
“There is no evidence America’s middle class will rally behind efforts aimed at
restoring US primacy in a unipolar world, escalating a new Cold War with China,
or waging a cosmic struggle between the world’s democracies and authoritarian
governments.”
That this
was not merely campaign rhetoric has been seen in some of the appointments. In
introducing Sullivan as his NSA to the press corps last month, Biden said: “Jake
understands my vision that economic security is national security, and it helps
steer what I call a foreign policy for the middle class.”
As part of
the effort to integrate the conduct of the foreign and domestic policies, Biden
has appointed Susan Rice, who served President Barack Obama as the UN Envoy and
the National Security Adviser, as the Director of his Domestic Policy Council.
Announcing her appointment last month, Biden said Rice will work closely with
Sullivan and senior economic officials to “align domestic policy, economic
policy and national security unlike ever before”. The incoming president
emphasised the same theme when announcing his nominee for US Trade
Representative, Katherine Tai, a position that has become critical for
America’s foreign economic policy.
Tai, an
experienced trade negotiator, is expected to be as tough as Robert Lighthizer,
Trump’s USTR. In her first speech earlier this month, Tai expanded on Biden’s
trade policy. “The president-elect’s vision is to implement a worker-centred
trade policy”. “What it means in practice is that US trade policy must benefit
regular Americans, communities and workers. And that starts with recognising
that people are not just consumers. They are also workers and wage earners.”
Biden’s
team takes charge with the recognition that the expansive globalist ambitions
of the American foreign policy establishment have lost much domestic political
support. Tempering the gospel of globalisation, resisting knee-jerk
interventionism, and avoiding ideological crusades are likely to be some of the
political impulses that Biden’s team brings to Washington.
While Biden
brings a very experienced team to implement his vision, he will inevitably
confront significant divisions on all these issues within the Administration,
between competing interests in the Democratic Party, and between Democrats and
Republicans.
The Trump
years have seen two important developments in India-US relations. One is the
sharpening tensions on trade and the other is the deepening defence and
security cooperation. The Biden moment offers the opportunity for Delhi to
overcome the bilateral differences on trade and elevate defence cooperation to
a higher level.
India’s own
attitudes to trade and globalisation have evolved under Prime Minister Narendra
Modi. A pragmatic international orientation to the Atmanirbhar strategy could
open some space for working with Biden on reforming the global trading system
and make it more politically sustainable.
An America
that moves towards doing less on the global security front will need strong
partners like India who can contribute more. A political understanding on
strategic burden-sharing would help Delhi and Washington develop deeper
military cooperation and more intensive diplomatic coordination in the
Indo-Pacific.
https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/joe-biden-us-president-capitol-hill-seige-india-relations-7151946/
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Thoughts On Democracy As Trump Exits, Finally…
By Sunanda K Datta Ray
Jan 19,
2021
Not long
before Donald Trump became the first-ever American President to be impeached
for a second time — this time with a real possibility of conviction — his
daughter Ivanka chose to remind the world of the close ties between her father
and Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The opening and closure in record time of a
study centre in Gwalior that exalted Nathuram Godse, the killer of Mohandas
Karamchand Gandhi, also occurred almost simultaneously.
It is the
legal action against Mr Trump by America’s senators and congressmen that grips
the world’s attention. The impeachment proceedings threaten to overwhelm
President-elect Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion plan to end “a crisis of deep human
suffering” by speeding up the supply of coronavirus vaccines and financially helping
Americans who are still struggling with the economic disaster caused by the
grim pandemic. It even distracts notice from the contradictions, if not crisis,
of democracy that Mr Trump’s rantings and ravings have unwittingly highlighted.
For it should never be forgotten that 74 million Americans voted for the man
who now seems bent on destroying the edifice on which he stood.
While he is
believed to have broken many constitutional norms during his four years in the
White House — including trying desperately hard to thwart the peaceful
transition of power to his legitimately elected successor — millions of
Americans had endorsed his excesses. The January 6 rioters who stormed the US
Capitol building in Washington chanting “Hang Mike Pence” and “Where’s Nancy?”
clearly saw both the Republican vice-president and the Speaker of the House —
the first and second in the line of presidential succession — as national
enemies.
There is
footage available of the rioters beating a police officer with a flagpole as
the crowd chanted “USA” and crushing another officer repeatedly in a door. The
violence resulted in five deaths; more might have perished if the police hadn’t
distracted the mob from breaching the debating chambers long enough to whisk
every legislator away to safety. The outrage to civilised governance was
infinitely worse. Some Repub-licans, after encouraging or standing by mute as
the President attacked the democratic process for months, have shaken
consciences. Ten of them joined all 222 Democrats in the House vote accusing Mr
Trump of “incitement of insurrection” that was passed on January 13, a week
after the attack.
Even those
who concede that Mr Biden obtained more votes can ask if that invalidates the
views of 74 million Americans.
A similar
question arose in 2000 when George W. Bush defeated Al Gore by winning 271
electoral votes, one more than a majority, despite Mr Gore receiving 543,895
more votes nationally. Many Americans did not regard it as a satisfactory
outcome, but they accepted it without protest.
The flaw
goes back to 507 BC when the Athenian Cleisthenes introduced demokratia, or
“rule by the people”, from demos, “the people,” and kratos, or “power”. Setting
aside the claims of Vaishali, Athens was the first democracy for the Western
world. But it was a far cry from the universal adult suffrage which we identify
with democracy today, and which can be indistinguishable from mob rule. In the
middle of the 4th century, for instance, Athens boasted about 100,000 citizens
(sons and daughters of citizens), some 10,000 metoikoi, or “resident
foreigners”, and 150,000 slaves. Only male citizens above 18 were a part of the
demos, meaning only about 40,000 people could participate in the democratic
process.
Around 460
BC, under the rule of the general Pericles (generals were among the only public
officials who were elected, not appointed), Athenian democracy began to evolve
into an autocracy (Herodotus’ “the one man, the best”) which eventually led to
Mao Zedong’s concept of “people’s democratic dictatorship”. The premise was
that the party and the State represented the people and acted on their behalf
to preserve the “dictatorship of the proletariat”, and save the government from
collapsing into a “dictatorship of the bourgeoisie”, or liberal democracy. Mao
famously used the term on June 30, 1949, commemorating the 28th anniversary of
the founding of the Communist Party of China.
However,
not all democracies are killed by Army coups or declarations of emergency. Many
are destroyed from within. The urge to perpetuate a particular group’s
stranglehold on power or the plea that a mere head count does not adequately
reflect the mood and temper of the people explains opportunistic devices like
Gen. Ayub Khan’s “basic democracy” (Pakistan), King Mahendra’s “panchayati
democracy” (Nepal) or “guided democracy” (Indonesia). Mr Trump’s “America
First” slogan is strongly echoed in the implicit argument that India’s majority
feels disenfranchised unless it enjoys special privileges. Hence the Hindu
Mahasabha’s attempt to propagate the “true nationalism which Godse stood for”
through an eponymous library.
Three years
ago, the Mahasabha installed a statue of Godse and was about to organise prayer
meetings there, but the statue was removed. This second try has to be seen in
the context of the constitutional dismemberment and demotion of Jammu and
Kashmir, motivated tinkering with academic curriculums, triumphalism over the
new Ram temple in Ayodhya, Hindutva trolls, opposition to inter-faith marriages
and attacks on Muslims in the name of cow protection. WhatsApp and Twitter are
said to be the main instruments for hounding the community.
In view of
such similar populist moves, it was not surprising that 39-year-old Ivanka
Trump, a senior adviser to her father, should choose this moment to recall her
2017 visit when she led a high-powered delegation to the Global Entrepreneur
Summit in Hyderabad. “As the world continues to battle Covid-19, our countries’
strong friendship in promoting global security, stability, and economic prosperity
is more important than ever,” she tweeted, paying particular tribute to Mr Modi
by name.
Given the
association with a man who is widely accused of desperate attempts to subvert
democracy, it’s a compliment the Prime Minister of an India that is still proud
of being the world’s largest democracy could have done without.
https://www.asianage.com/opinion/columnists/190121/sunanda-k-datta-ray-thoughts-on-democracy-as-trump-exits-finally.html
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