Science & Reason

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AIPSN Position Paper on Lakshadweep and Controversial Islands Development Plan

click here to see the pdf of the position paper

click here to read an article published in NewsClick relating to this issue

Lakshadweep and Controversial Islands Development Plan:

(World Environment Day, 5 June 2021)

 

World Environment Day falls on 5 June each year, and the theme for the coming decade has been declared as ‘Ecological Restoration’. Tragically, however, a central concern in India these days is the ecological and human disaster unfolding in the Lakshadweep archipelago in the Arabian Sea, as well as in the Andaman & Nicobar Islands chain on the eastern flank of peninsular India in the Indian Ocean, all in the name of ‘island development.’

In a keynote address to a Conference of Parties to the UN Convention to Combat Desertification in 2019, the Prime Minister of India, Shri Narendra Modi, announced an increase of India’s commitment to restoration of degraded lands from 21 million hectares to 26 million hectares by 2030. India’s Nationally Determined Commitments (NDC) under the Paris Agreement on climate change pledges to reduce emissions intensity of GDP by 33-35% by 2030, increase share of renewable energy in electricity generation to 40% of total by 2030 (stepped up further since then with a new goal of 450 GW of renewables compared to 175 GW earlier).  These and other similar commitments have often been made by the PM and other government leaders to international audiences and in different international Treaties. These promises are made while repeatedly citing Indian (Hindu) traditional and civilizational values of respect for nature and sustainable lifestyles.

Closer examination shows some of these targets to be modest at best, and many concerns persist on the conditions, qualifications and negative impacts related to these targets, as discussed further below. Perhaps more importantly, policies and actions of this government in India reveal its international stance to be mostly posturing, and the professed environmental concerns to be largely for the sake of image-building. Domestically, in sharp contrast, this government has systematically worked to promote ‘ease of doing business’ and consistently acted in favour of corporate industrial and commercial interests in extraction of value from nature at the cost of both the ecosystem and local populations. Mining, industrial and commercial projects inside forest areas and even infringing upon wildlife sanctuaries especially through the contrived device of ‘linear projects’ have now become commonplace. The transfer of wealth to corporations through shifting of natural public commons to private hands, has been facilitated by drastic dilution or reversal of several key environmental regulations.

Framing the Context: Changing Environmental Regulations

Earlier violations and piecemeal regulatory changes through executive notifications have been sought to be regularized through the draft Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Notification 2020. Draft EIA 2020 sought to vastly enlarge the categories of projects which require only cursory regulatory examination or even avoid regulatory clearance all-together.  It severely dilutes environmental appraisal norms and reduces, or even completely omits, the role of public consultations in many sectors, while allowing the central government unlimited authority by reducing clearance requirements for projects of ‘strategic importance’ the parameters of which remain undefined. Draft EIA 2020 also turns a blind eye to egregious violations of environmental regulations and outright illegal activities by permitting post-facto environmental clearance of impermissible projects after simply paying a small compounding fine. Following widespread opposition, this Draft is currently in limbo, but many of its provisions are being implemented nonetheless, and it appears that the trend of roll-back of environmental regulations and people’s participation in safeguarding them will continue.

Regulatory changes have also been brought about across various sectors including forests, water resources, coastal areas, land use, mineral resource extraction, industrial safety and hazardous materials. Key amendments have been introduced in the Land Acquisition Act 2015, diluting the earlier Act by increasing exemptions from local consent and social impact assessment. The Coastal Regulations Zone (CRZ) rules have also been weakened by reducing the exclusion zone from 100m to 50m and other measures that are expected to open up the fragile coastline, already subject to erosion and impact of sea-level rise, for industry, real estate and tourism. Experts say this would also be exploited by corporate houses including under the Sagarmala programme which envisions a ‘garland’ of major ports. The draft National Forest Policy of 2018 promotes the interests of forestry corporations and private players, and weakens the Forest Rights Act 2006 secured by prolonged and sustained struggles of forest dwellers and other popular movements. Between June 2014 and May 2018, less than 1% of proposed projects seeking clearance have been rejected by the wildlife authority. In the government’s scheme of things, issues of environmental damage and linked people’s survival, sustenance and livelihoods come a distant second to business interests, so much so that some have dubbed the concerned department the ‘Ministry against Environment!’ Government inaction on aspects like solid waste management, air pollution and river cleanliness continue to worsen local environments and adversely impact people’s health.

Government Inaction on Climate Change

The Government’s response to the challenges of climate change follows a similar dual path, a seemingly strong posture abroad including in the international negotiations, and contrasting weak actions domestically. To put things in perspective, while India’s NDC compares favourably with hitherto low-ambition emission cuts promised by developed countries especially the US, these targets have been rated by the well-reputed Climate Tracker as ‘moderate’ and compatible with the 2 degrees C goal. Perhaps more seriously, India continues to pursue an externally-driven climate policy driven mainly by foreign policy considerations. Domestic action to adapt or build resilience to serious climate impacts in India, which is considered among the most affected regions of the world, is scarce. This is in sharp contrast to the stance of most developing countries, especially the least developed countries (LDCs) and the Small Island Developing States (SIDS) who have approached climate change and international negotiations based on the severe impacts they are experiencing and the existential challenge posed by these impacts.

With worsening polar ice melt and sea-level rise, India’s coastal areas with over 170 million people are expected to be seriously impacted by coastal erosion, sea-water ingress and extensive permanent coastal submergence due to sea-level rise added to high tides and storm surges. The think tank Climate Central has projected that 36 million people could be affected in India in the near term, with the portal also providing extremely interesting data as well as dramatic interactive maps based on latest satellite data showing extensive inundation, particularly of densely populated urban agglomerations around Kochi, Mumbai and Surat on the west coast, and Chennai, Puri and Kolkata in the east. All these impacts are being worsened by rapid construction and other economic activities on or near the coast, and degradation of natural protective barriers such as mangroves.

There is an imminent threat for Lakshadweep and Andaman & Nicobar, with experts predicting that many of the islands may become uninhabitable by 2100 because of sea-level rise due to climate change. Yet, government action on any of these issues is insubstantial. Programmes initiated such as the Technology Missions under the UPA Government’s National Action Plan on Climate Change in 2008-10 have been allowed to drift and fade away, being under-funded and lacking political support especially under the present Government. Even serious scientific studies of climate impacts have not yet seen the light of the day, with one major study expected to release its report only in the next year or so. Adaptation actions mostly fall under jurisdiction of State governments which are starved of funds and lack the necessary knowledge and capabilities required, calling for the Central government to take the initiative and the major burden. It needs emphasis that adaptation programmes are cost intensive, and the later the actions are undertaken, the more expensive they will become. This is a monumental problem facing the present and future generations of the Indian people.  In this scenario, it is surprising that the main policy being discussed in the case of Lakshadweep is not on building protection against climate disasters, but instead on real estate development in the islands.

Recent Developments in Lakshadweep

The recently appointed Administrator of Lakshadweep, Praful Khoda Patel (he is the first political appointee to this post in the Union Territory and had earlier served as Home Minister in the Narendra Modi-led Gujarat government), has drawn up and sent to the Home Ministry for approval, a new Lakshadweep Development Authority Regulation 2021 and a whole raft of other draft Regulations on Panchayats, Prevention of Anti-Social Activities (PASA) and Animal Preservation. Together, these assign unquestionable authority to the Administrator including giving him total eminent domain powers over the territory and people of the Islands, enabling the administration to take-over of any part of the islands in the name of ‘development activities’ including ecologically damaging mining and extraction of mineral resources. This also allows forcible removal or relocation of any islander owning that land, despite the fact that over 95% of islanders belong to Scheduled Tribes whose lands cannot be easily alienated by earlier laws; to by-pass panchayats and other local government bodies; and, amazingly, placing any such actions by the Administrator beyond appeal or judicial review. The recent control asserted by the administrator extends beyond the environmental realm, with measures like relaxation of customary alcohol prohibition in the Muslim-dominated islands and even arbitrary reduction of Covid-19 related restrictions.

The Administrator claims that all these measures have been taken in pursuit of development of Lakshadweep ‘along the lines of the Maldives’.  His plans, so far unchecked by the Home Ministry under which the UT administration functions, mark out a developmental model which is sought to be imposed on the Lakshadweep people irrespective of their desires or interests. As a pre-emptive measure, the changes proposed allow for throttling of local opposition. In addition, measures taken by the Administrator include banning the sale, storage or consumption of beef, integral to the food habits of the overwhelmingly (95%) Muslim population with ST status; removing non-vegetarian food from school meals programmes; and closing down the islands’ only government-run dairy farm and ferrying in milk from Gujarat instead. There is also a clear attempt to de-link Lakshadweep from its historical links with Kerala by diverting supply ships from Beypore Port near Kochi to Mangalore in BJP-ruled Karnataka. Despite Malayalam being the lingua franca in Lakshadweep, recent news reports claim an attempt by the administration to shift its legal jurisdiction from the Kerala High Court to Karnataka High Court.

Widespread opposition by the locals has been met with heavy handed repression by the administration. Protesters have been arrested and incarcerated without trial using the PASR or ‘Goonda Act’. Local artisanal fishers have been attacked and their nets, gear and huts destroyed in the name of coastal regulations. Thousands of contract workers have been summarily laid off. The local people and their culture are seen as obstacles to be eliminated, while their island home is viewed as real estate and for its potential to generate wealth for the ruling state government. From the measures taken, the administrator seems hell-bent not only on stamping out dissent but also undermining the democratic roots of local governance and popular mobilization in Lakshadweep.

The Controversial Islands Development Plan

The recent proposals of this administrator cannot be seen in vacuum or as the actions of an individual alone, and applicable only in the case of Lakshwadeep. The larger and uncomfortable questions remain, particularly regarding the nature of the envisaged ‘development’ plans in the islands and the interests behind them. In June 2017 itself, the Indian Government had constituted an Island Development Agency under the Chairmanship of the Union Home Minister, which had mandated Niti Aayog to steer the programme for ‘Holistic Development of Islands.’ Important to note is how a body introduced by the government as ‘just’ a think-tank to replace the earlier supposedly authoritarian Planning Commission, is essentially acting as a centralized project planning and implementation oversight body with quasi-executive powers and outside all existing government structures, with accountability only to the home minister. Following preliminary studies, the CEO of Niti Aayog made a presentation to potential investors in August 2018, stating that the Government had accorded high priority to the development of the islands and was putting forward concrete and carefully worked out project ideas for the same. In order to further ease the path of investors, local Island Development Authorities were empowered to provide single-window facilitation to projects, with pre-obtained regulatory clearances for land use, environmental impact and so on!

More studies and information on the proposed projects are available in a May 2019 ‘think’ report by Niti Aayog staffers titled ‘Transforming the Islands through creativity and innovation’. Tourism related projects are central to the plans for Lakshadweep, unabashedly modelled after the Maldives. Plans for the Andaman and Nicobar Islands are even more ambitious and fanciful including several airports, container trans-shipment ports, a new greenfield city to act as a financial hub ‘on the lines of Singapore and Hong Kong,’ with strategic value given proximity to the Malacca straits. The Maldives is a group of larger islands with a high-end tourism model, with few links to the bulk of the island population although adding hugely to the Maldivian GDP. Even there, the strains of the current tourism-based model of development are showing both on local ecosystems especially on the coral reefs, the very lifeline of the archipelago, and in adverse socio-economic impacts.

 

The feasibility and desirability of the replication of these international models, both in Lakshadweep (a group of 36 small islands comprises just 10 inhabited islands, 17 uninhabited islands, 4 newly formed islets and 5 submerged reefs) and the contrasting Andaman and Nicobar group (consisting of 576 relatively larger islands of which only 38 are inhabited) is not examined. Instead, the Niti Aayog studies bemoan the stagnation of international tourists at 15,000 in A&N and 500-odd in Lakshadweep in contrast with 1.5 million foreign tourists hosted by the Maldives annually.  The potential of integrating island tourism with tourism in mainland India, whereby a wider set of attraction can be offered to international tourists, simultaneously promoting forms of environmentally friendly tourism and involving the local population in more sustainable tourism models are left explored. Rather, further studies by the Niti Aayog in association with international agencies, project feasibility of huge tourist inflows of 5,000-10,000 persons per day in the A&N islands which would be around 1.5 million per year in each of several islands, unimaginably, more than half the current foreign tourist arrivals in the whole of mainland India! Other Niti Aayog studies apparently also confirm such high carrying capacity estimates. This level can only be realized if all resources are ferried from the mainland, along with huge cost to the local ecology due to deforestation, change of land use patterns and disposal of the enormous quantities of wastes generated. With a large mainland back-up in India, the local population of the islands become virtually irrelevant.

Consequences of the Envisaged ‘Development’ Model

Lakshadweep is already suffering from severe coastal erosion, and experts predict that some islands may become uninhabitable due to sea level rise related to climate change. Various other negative ecological impacts are also predicted by experts such as coral reefs bleaching, damage to fish habitat and breeding grounds etc.

The Environmental Impact Assessment of Projects in the Little Andaman Island records the enormous ecological risks to pristine local forests, mangroves, marine life and endangered species such as Leather-backed Turtles. One of the proposed projects, in Little Andamans envisions a full-size airport and aerocity, expanded tourism centres, convention centres, and hospitals or ‘medicity’, a leisure district spread with a tourism SEZ and ‘nature’ retreats, and a development of a new 100 km east-west coastal ring road and a mass transit system. The total area of the island is only around 737 sq. kms – about the size of Mumbai or Hyderabad, of which 95% or about 700 sq. km is reserve forest. Of this, about 450 sq. km is designated as the Onge Reserve, home to this highly endangered early aboriginal tribe of whom there are only 100 or so persons left. This Project calls for clearing about 224 sq. km or 32% of the reserve forest with around two million trees and de-notifying 135 sq. km or about 30% of the Onge Reserve. But all this may not matter to Niti Aayog planners and their supporters in the Union Government. Even reported opposition from the forest department has met with little response from the government. The Union Environment Ministry has granted environmental clearance in the Andamans, coolly noting that the Onges, for instance, can simply be relocated elsewhere. Clearly, in this model of island development, the environment matters little and the local population matters even less.

 

In the three years since the Island Development plans were advanced, including the recent Little Andamans ‘super’ project dangling all kinds of inducements to the corporate sector, reports say that investors are yet to come forward, possibly due to the risks, challenges and viability doubts. But, irrespective of the actual tourist impact in these islands, the government in charge stands to make huge profits from land rents and prospective corporate deals.

As the Union Government grows more authoritarian and asserts greater authority especially in the Union Territories, environmental regulatory systems are being either captured or strangulated, and local populations are simply ignored or crushed in the name of development. National and internationally committed environmental goals like the forestry targets appear unrealistic in the face of systematic encroachment upon forest areas as discussed above, which cannot be offset by increasing ‘green cover’ outside forests, for instance along highways, since a group of trees however large simply cannot perform the same ecological services as a forest. The forests of Andaman cannot be compensated by afforestation in mainland India and neither can the lives of the indigenous peoples. Across India, not only have many of the recent changes been detrimental to the environment and people’s lives and livelihoods, they uniformly suppress people’s rights and seek to reverse many of the hard won regulations resulting from people’s movements in the past few decades. Institutional autonomy, regulatory structures and even judicial oversight are being systematically undermined in the field of environment as much as in other arenas of governance. Even the National Green Tribunal has been repeatedly attacked and sought to be weakened in several ways. While rarely compromising in the face of opposition by peoples movements, civil society organizations and experts, the relentless assault continues in different forms and across various theatres. This situation calls for urgent and large coalitions across the country to resist the grandiose so-called “development” plans of the current ruling dispensation.

 

For clarifications contact:

P.Rajamanickam, General Secretary, AIPSN gsaipsn@gmail.com, 9442915101 @gsaipsn

 

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On Covaxin Interim Results from Phase 3 trials  

click here to read the English pdf of AIPSNStatement-on-CovaxinPhase3InterimResults-7Mar

On Covaxin Interim Results from Phase 3 trials

7 Mar 2021

All India Peoples Science Network welcomes the first interim efficacy data from Phase-3 clinical trials as released by M/S Bharat Biotech for the indigenously developed Covid-19 vaccine “Covaxin”. Based on the initial 43 cases of Covid-19 of which 39 were in the placebo arm and 7 were in the vaccinated arm of the phase 3 trial involving 25800 participants with 1:1 random allocation of vaccine and placebo, Bharat Biotech announced a point estimate of vaccine efficacy of 80.56% with two doses four weeks apart. The trial also showed protection from infection and severe disease across different segments of the population. Bharat Biotech has planned to release a second interim analysis at 87 cases, and a final analysis when 130 cases are reached in the near future. AIPSN looks forward to peer review and publication of all the data at the earliest.

Peer reviewed Phase-3 trial data should be submitted by Bharat Biotech to the Drug Controller General of India (DCGI) at the earliest so that the regulator may issue revised emergency use approval for Covaxin, doing away with the various conditions attached to it, notably the requirement of administering the vaccine in clinical trial, which were considered necessary by DCGI and its Subject Expert Committee because of the absence of Phase-3 trial data at that time. These steps would overcome the objections of a large section of the scientific community and civil society in India, who had raised their voice against premature approval to Covaxin without Phase-3 trial data.

Once approval is granted by DCGI to Covaxin on par with Covishield, Covaxin can justifiably join the global set of approved vaccines against the Covid-19 disease, enabling it to cater to the huge international demand for vaccines especially among developing countries. An indigenous Covid-19 vaccine, developed by the National Institute of Virology (NIV) under the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), and manufactured by Bharat Biotech, legitimately gaining such acceptance internationally, would indeed be a matter of pride for Indian science and industry.

Statements by Government spokespersons claiming vindication of their support for the premature approval for Covaxin and its inclusion in the vaccination rollout, are entirely misplaced. As anticipated by those who strongly opposed both moves, including the AIPSN, the premature approval for Covaxin without Phase-3 data, clearly under Government pressure, has avoidably caused immense embarrassment at home and abroad, damaged the reputation of Indian science and regulatory institutions, and added to vaccine hesitancy in India. Little would have been lost if DCGI had waited for Phase-3 data now available. According to publicly available data, only about 10% of the approximately 16 million vaccination doses administered so far have been of Covaxin, a gap that could have easily been made up with Covishield.

AIPSN hopes that the nearly 81% efficacy shown by the first interim analysis of Covaxin phase 3 trials will now help dispel the earlier vaccine hesitancy due to hasty approval without data. AIPSN appeals to all eligible people to get vaccinated in order to protect themselves and prevent others who cannot be vaccinated from getting Covid-19. It is hoped that Bharat Biotech will now ramp up production to required levels and join the international battle against Covid-19 with full confidence. It is time the Government realizes that promotion of true self-reliance is not well-served by artificial support or false claims, but by promotion of quality R&D and products that can match the best in the world and compete globally on its own merits.

 

 

For clarifications contact:

D. Raghunandan 9810098621 S.Krishnaswamy 9442158638

P. Rajamanickam, General Secretary, AIPSN gsaipsn@gmail.com, 9442915101 @gsaipsn

 

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AIPSN Statement on Enforcement Directorate Raids on Newsclick

click here to read press release of AIPSN-Statement-EDraidsNC-10Feb2021-LrHdsd

AIPSN Statement on Enforcement Directorate Raids on Newsclick

10 Feb 2021

 

Reports of raids by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on the offices of web-based news and current affairs portal Newsclick and the residences of its editors and director have shocked many in the media, civil society and all those working to strengthen critical thinking and scrutiny of government policies in the public interest. Newsclick’s coverage of various issues in science and technology (S&T), and public policies related to S&T, have provided an alternative and informed perspective from that of the government as well as from much of the mainstream media especially in TV.  The All India Peoples Science Network (AIPSN) is deeply appreciative of the insightful, useful and evidence-based coverage of the governmental policies and responses to the Covid-19 pandemic, including an interactive dashboard on Covid-19 data both in India and worldwide. In recent times, Newsclick has also provided valuable coverage of the farmers’ struggle and informative articles by experts on issues related to the struggle.

AIPSN is deeply disturbed by these ED raids on Newsclick. Newsclick has stated that it is confident of proving its innocence on all charges alleged by ED. These raids, in timing and circumstance, can only be viewed  as part of a pattern of governmental suppression of critical voices in civil society and the media  in general through a variety of coercive means. ED and similar agencies are now seen to be regularly used as partisan tools of intimidation and vindictiveness. Strangely, such actions always are targeted only against voices critical of government policies.

AIPSN has been active nationwide in making the public aware of these dangerous trends, especially targeting Universities, the media, civil society and public intellectuals. These trends have serious implications for the Constitutional obligation to develop critical thinking and a scientific temper among the people. As a network of people centred science movements, AIPSN is acutely aware that science itself cannot thrive if critical thinking is suppressed in any and all spheres.  AIPSN has been annually observing 20th August as National Scientific Temper Day, the date of the murder of well-known campaigner for scientific temper and against superstition, Dr.Narendra Dabholkar, followed soon after by the similar murders of Govind Pansare, M.M.Kalburgi and Gauri Lankesh, all probably by the same extremist hindutva group determined to silence voices of rationality, critical thinking and scientific temper.

At this crucial crossroads of our nation’s history as a vibrant, diverse, secular and democratic society, AIPSN expresses its solidarity with Newsclick and other independent media outlets and journalists and urges the Government to not strangle voices of democracy so essential for Science.

 

For clarifications contact:

 P.Rajamanickam, General Secretary, AIPSN

gsaipsn@gmail.com, 9442915101 @gsaipsn

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On the draft STIP2020: Need for a people-centered and future-oriented STIP based on reality

click here to see the Gmail submission of AIPSN Response to draft STIP2020

click here for the AIPSN-response-DraftSTIP2020-30Jan2021 in English

 

30Jan2021

All India Peoples Science Network (AIPSN) Response

 

On the draft STIP2020:

Need for a people-centered and future-oriented STIP based on reality

  1. During the ongoing pandemic, the Science Policy Forum and Department of Science and Technology initiated a series of discussions in different tracks to discuss various parts for formulating a draft STIP2020. On Dec 31st a draft was released in English online and a feedback response date of 25th Jan was given. Two days before the date, the deadline was extended to 31st Jan.
  2. In the economic transformation of Japan, South Korea and China their policies relating to Science, Technology and Innovation played a significant role in these countries’ development with advanced capabilities in technologies of the second and third industrial revolutions, poised to also develop such capabilities in 4th generation technologies expected to dominate the global economy over the next two decades. Several other Asian countries such as Singapore and Taiwan have also developed advanced manufacturing capabilities and know-how. All these nations have followed what we may broadly call a self-reliant pathway in S&T, consciously investing in developing their own knowledge, industrial and human resource capabilities over the years, as against depending on “Western” MNCs or companies for this. In the Global Innovation Index China now a rank 14th for the 2nd time in a row and remains the only middle-income economy in the GII top 30. India is at the 48th position. This follows the consistent growth of Gross Expenditure on R&D (GERD) with respect to the GDP in the case of China that grew from 0.6 in 1996 to 2.2 now, while in contrast India has remained hovering around 0.6 since 1996. GERD of the “Asian Tiger” economies follows a similar trajectory. It is also important to highlight the fact that China has used per capita GDP as a metric to measure its progress, thereby placing emphasis on the share of its working population in growth, rather than just GDP as India and many other countries do.
  1. The biggest weakness of draft STIP 2020 is that the policy is not rooted in the economic and industrial scenario of the country, and the direction in which these are visualized to transform over the next, say ten to fifteen years. Without such a vision, draft STIP2020 is cast in a vacuum. Further, the draft STIP2020 does not take cognizance of the present state of Science, Technology and Innovation in India, and put forward a policy that starts from where we are and leads to where we want to go. Similarly, the suggestions proposed do not also reckon with the institutional and systemic weaknesses or strengths. In this context, the very feasibility and utility of the draft STIP2020 are open to question, however nice this or that proposal sounds. Incidentally, STIP 2013 envisioned positioning India among the top 5 global scientific powers by 2020. Do we then presume that India has achieved that and now moves towards the top 3?
  1. A well thought out and designed policy that is sensitive to the needs of not only the people of India but of the world can make a tremendous difference. However, for inclusive and sustainable growth, it is important to first chart the practical steps for effective implementation of S&T policies. Such an approach is needed for balanced and integrated development taking into account the social and environmental aspects. In order to do this, it is important to first ensure the penetration of basic infrastructure of roads, electricity, communications and internet, water, public health, education and skills, to all parts of the country. Just as India’s R&D expenditure has historically been miserably low, so too has India’s investment in the health and education of the majority of its population and potential work force.  No less is the importance of a federated approach to take into account the geographical and developmental diversity amongst the States and Union Territories of India. A rigid one shoe fits all approach will not be useful. There has to be inbuilt flexibility in terms of structures, funding and implementation considering the developmental and infrastructural variations in different regions.
  1. The draft STIP2020 is not an authentic national STI policy. At best, it is like a policy for the Department of Science and Technology (DST). A transformational STI policy needs to bring on board all the government departments of the union Government, the state governments and the public in a collaborative mode for the formulation of STIP 2020 draft.
  1. The vision of the policy as mentioned “to build individual and institutional excellence in STI with the aspiration to achieve the highest level of global recognitions and awards in the coming decade” is completely flawed. One cannot have a national policy based only on awards and recognitions: if India does outstanding science and develops novel advanced technologies, awards and recognitions will follow. As the Nobel Laureate Venkatraman Ramakrishnan has said “Science flourishes when people are free to question authority”. But that cannot be built into a policy. It is an academic, research and society-wide culture and part of the scientific temper which is encouraged by our Constitution.
  1. The draft policy keeps referring to undefined Traditional Knowledge Systems and in one place links it with heritage. This along with references to undefined grassroots innovations is in dissonance with the vision to position India among the top three scientific superpowers in the decade to come. However, highlighting these in the draft STIP2020, in the context of what is currently being done in India under the rubric of these terms, does pave the way for significant funding for spurious and inefficacious efforts, often pulling in an opposite direction to the desired future-oriented STI.
  1. The draft STIP2020 is astonishingly filled with a plethora of new Institutions and Funding Schemes: the Capacity Building Authority, the STI Policy Institute, the overarching Strategic Technology Board, a Strategic Development Fund, a national STI Financing Authority, an STI Development Bank, the national STI governance mechanism, the National STI Observatory, Indian Science and Technology Archive of Research (INDSTA), Advanced Missions in Innovative Research Ecosystems (ADMIRE), a centralized database on all forms of Financial Incentives, and Inter-State Science, Technology and Innovation Council (IS-STIC). While it is necessary that funding mechanisms be centrally coordinated, the structural framework along with the control structure also needs to be decentralized in order to take into account the spirit of cooperative federalism envisaged in the Constitution of India.  These numerous new Institutions would only lead to additional bureaucratic structures in an already top-heavy science administration, draining even more funds from actual research. There is also no point creating new institutions and funding schemes without examining the problem of non-functioning or malfunctioning of existing ones.  It is ironic that these suggestions for new Institutions come at a time when the government is engaged in closing down many S&T Institutions and driving them to raise their own funds, therefore reducing the amount of research done, showing again how distanced the draft STIP2020 is from ground realities.
  1. The draft STIP2020 talks of attracting Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in STI, reduction in corporate tax rates for foreign MNCs, fast track clearances, easing land acquisitions, adequate means for incorporating FDI etc. to be explored on a need basis. This is definitely detrimental to public  sector research in agriculture  aiming  to strive  for food  self sufficiency, security and especially nutritional security. Self-reliant STI can certainly not be built through FDI or by foreign MNCs who may manufacture in India but will not transfer technologies as experience hitherto has amply shown. Experience of Japan, S.Korea and China is exactly the same: they embarked on a self-reliant path precisely because MNCs and Western companies will never part with their technologies, since they know full well that it is knowledge and technology, which controls industry and the economy. This is yet another cardinal mistake in the draft STIP2020; following the present Governments idea that manufacturing in India by foreign companies/MNCs directly or through FDI in junior Indian partners, is also “Make in India” and also represents Atma Nirbhar Bharat. Nothing could be further from the truth. The draft STIP2020 is extremely permissive to imports, and by this route it plans to achieve ” Atmanirbhar Bharat” and India’s emergence as the third global power in STI! And for that, science is now given a new role: “S&T for diplomatic benefits” and “diplomacy for S&T development”! In this draft STIP2020, the Indian Diaspora are to serve as conduits in the mercantilist exploitation of science, in which India’s intellectual resources, like her scientists, will be the basic inputs in this Atmanirbhar Bharat’s Global Assembly Line.
  1. The long-term and continuing reluctance of the private sector in India to invest in R&D is notorious but is not meaningfully addressed in the draft STIP2020. Much of this is due to Indian corporates’ preference to take the easy route of foreign collaboration or technology imports repeatedly incentivized by industrial and taxation policies of successive governments, even further promoted by the current emphasis on FDI as the major engine of industrial and technological development. Minor policy incentives or inducements will not change this, and a thrust for genuine self-reliance is a must.
  1. The draft STIP2020 also provides an escape clause for the Central Government from the need for enhanced investments in R&D by proposing that all other stakeholders such as State governments, PSUs, SMEs, private sector, Universities, Research Institutions and so on would be required to set aside earmarked funds for R&D. This is a futile and sub-optimal exercise and would only lead to ineffectual “R&D” on paper, merely to satisfy some bureaucratic requirement. In the absence of mission-oriented R&D programmes at scale, the goal of transformative R&D to take India into a leading position in the 4th industrial revolution would remain a pipedream.
  1. There is no meaningful discussion of employment in a potentially changed capital and technology-intensive industrial scenario, and how the draft STIP2020 proposes to address this issue. There is therefore no mention of the working people, farmers, workers, migrants, unorganized workers, rural unemployed and under-employed. Nor is there any indication of how the STI is going to benefit and take them along in the process of inclusive and sustainable growth. This begs the question as to who this draft STIP2020 bell tolls for?
  1. Another big miss in the draft STIP2020 is the absence of addressing societal goals that can be targeted through S&T and by promoting scientific temper, issues that were emphasized in the Scientific Policy Resolution 1958 (SPR1958).Even in its mention of the SPR1958 document, the draft STIP2020 does not mention these aims of the SPR1958 and limits itself to stating that “S&T were seen as vehicles for the onward journey towards socio-economic transformation and nation building”. The role that S&T can play in alleviating hunger (India stands 102 among 117 countries in World Hunger Index), combating disease, ensuring health, hygiene, housing, employment and making the reach of science equitable are not addressed at all in the document.
  1. The draft STIP2020 is anything but what it says: “It is to be noted that the new STIP policy revolves around the principles of being decentralized, evidence-informed, bottom-up, experts-driven, and inclusive.” There are a lot of hollow claims of producing an evidence-driven, inclusive and bottom-up policy process steered and coordinated for the well being of the nation and its people with socio-economic and environmental considerations. The rambling draft policy makes all the right noises but lacks foundations of reality making it a catch all bucket list which without the grounding will remain wishful thinking. It is essential to cut the fluff and make it lean but meaningful.
  1. A major appreciative aspect of the draft STIP2020 is the very mention of LGBTQ+ and all that follows. But again it is dampened by the lack of specifics and arriving at how the changes can be made. The other aspect that is appealing is the talk of Open Science but the sheen is lost, due to not trying to figure out why it has not progressed, as needed, so far.
  1. The importance given to Science Communication is welcome, but it is disappointing to see the stress on scientists rather than on imbuing the lay citizen with scientific temper, critical thinking and the world view of science. It is puzzling that, rather than acknowledge and build upon the existing almost 40 year old people’s science movements in the country committed to and involved with activities towards this goal; this policy glibly seeks to “create” new science movements. Civil society organizations should be left to themselves and supported, but government-created “science movements” would be self-defeating and work against developing critical thinking which often requires looking at governmental S&T policies with a critical eye.
  1. The STIP will affect all sections of the public and, as mentioned in the draft STIP2020, it is meant to be inclusive. Moreover, it also intends to make science literature available in all languages and geographic regions. So a good starting point will be to make the draft STIP2020 available in all the Scheduled languages in the Constitution of India so that the public including researchers at all levels can meaningfully understand and discuss it to come forward with suggestions.
  1. There is no particular urgency to have the STIP brought out within the coming months especially in the time of the pandemic. It may therefore be a good idea to revise the Draft in a transparent manner taking into account comments received, and the revised STIP then placed before parliament allowing for scrutiny by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on S&T.

 

AIPSN demands for transforming the draft STIP2020

into a people-centered and future-oriented STIP based on reality:

 

a) The draft STIP2020 be made available officially on the website in all the Scheduled languages and propagated through social media and TV. After that is made available at least two months period should be given for wide dissemination and involvement in discussions. 

b) There should be a provision for giving feedback through hard copies also apart from only online as online access is still limited in the country. One contact person should be mentioned to ensure that the hard copies will be received correctly. 

c) All the suggestions received, as hard copies and online, must be put into an indexed publicly available online database so that there can be cross checking about incorporation in the STIP. 

d) The draft STIP2020 has to reduce the rhetoric and make it more realistic 

e) The NEP has not been debated in the Parliament. Therefore, endorsing or linking NEP in sections of the STI is not democratic. It is important to involve the Parliament in the STI through formation of a Parliamentary Standing Committee for STI. This is also one of the recommendations by UNESCO for countries to democratise the STIP. 

f) The many structures that are envisaged in the STI need to be decentralised, not in funding but in functionality and structure, taking into account the cooperative federalism which is the spirit of the Constitution. 

g) The four decades old popular science movements and some even older science popularization organizations in the country need to be acknowledged and built upon rather than artificially “creating” new science movements to act at the behest of the government. 

h) There were only limited online attempts to involve or seek the opinions of the wide thriving S&T community in the country. There needs to be more engaged consultations with such S&T communities distributed across the country to evolve this national policy. 

30Jan2021

 

For clarifications contact:

  1. Krishnaswamy 9442158638
  2. Rajamanickam, General Secretary, AIPSN

gsaipsn@gmail.com, 9442915101 @gsaipsn

 

 

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‘Science for social revolution’: People’s Science Movements and democratizing science in India

click here for the pdf of the article   

Authors:

Venkateswaran T.V.

Abstract:

Often, new social movements engaged with science and society are characterised as contesting objectivity; the neutrality of modern science seeking to legitimise ‘lay perspectives’. It has been an article of faith among scholars to view third world movements as anti-science, anti-modernity and post-developmentalist. This commentary describes ideological framework, modes of action and organisation of the All India People’s Science Network (AIPSN), one of the People’s science movement (PSMs) active for more than the past four decades. They dispute the dominant development trajectory and science and technology-related policies for reinforcing the existing inequities. Nevertheless, they see ‘science’ as a powerful ally for realising their radical emancipatory vision of ‘science for social revolution’. Mobilising ‘science activists’ as unique alternate communicators, they strive for lay-expert collaboration. The canonical framing of third world social movements as postcolonial and anti-modern does not capture this unique case from India. Further studies are required to tease out such strands of social movements elsewhere.

 

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.22323/2.19060308
Stop Monopoly Publishers Efforts To Deny Public Access to Scientific Publications
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Stop Monopoly Publishers Efforts To Deny Public Access to Scientific Publications

click here English pdf SciHub-AIPSNStatement29Dec2020FinalP

Click here for Hindi version pdf of SciHub-AIPSN statement

click here for Kannada version pdf of SciHub-AIPSN Statement

Click here for Odia version pdf of SciHub-AIPSN statement

Stop Monopoly Publishers Efforts To Deny Public Access to Scientific Publications

Three major academic publishers—Elsevier Ltd., Wiley India Pvt. Ltd., American Chemical Society— have filed a petition in Delhi High Court asking for dynamic blocking of Sci-Hub and Libgen in India. SciHub is the first site to allow mass and public access to research publications while LibGen allows access to books. These websites help Indian scientists, teachers and students to freely access and download research publications and books even if they are behind paywalls.

Why are Elsevier, Wiley and American Chemical Society filing this suit? Journal publishing has one of the highest profit margins amongst different sectors and is now a 10 billion USD industry. The profit margin from journal publishing is nearly 40% or twice that of Google! Three publishers who have filed this case together publish 40% of scientific publication and control more than 50% of the publications in science and social sciences worldwide.

Knowledge and its access are accepted under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a fundamental human right. In reality, it is denied by the current system where a group of publishing monopolies make super-profits from the work. It is scientists who volunteer their time to both referee the papers and uphold quality, and also sit on editorial boards that manage the publishing process. These publishers have thus no contribution whatsoever to the research writing, refereeing and editing of the papers but enjoy the fruits of the mental and physical labour of researchers. Ironically, even those who produce the content, have to pay for accessing their own work. This is the business model of scientific publishing which is bad for science, while these publishers reap huge profits.

Alexandra Elbakyan, a young Kazakhstan science scholar, started Sci-Hub due to lack of access for the bulk of science scholars to good quality journal articles. Under the cases filed in the US, she can be arrested anywhere and transported to the US to face trial and a lengthy prison sentence. It is not an accident that the case filed in Delhi High Court asks for her address to be disclosed so that the full might of the US and its extra-territorial reach can be used to stop her.

Even well-off educational institutions such as the University of California in the US, are finding it difficult to pay the huge costs charged by these monopoly publishers and have refused to pay for the subscriptions. Significantly, researchers in Universities and Institutes who have access to these publications including the US, access SciHub, as it is much easier to download papers as a one-stop place with about 80 million papers.

An analysis in 2016 showed that Indian scholars downloaded about 7 million papers in one year using SciHub. Without SciHub, it would have cost the Indian Universities or students around 200-250 million USD, which neither the students nor the universities have.

Open Access journals allow people to read and download content free but the content producers – scientists and researchers or their institutions or funding agencies — have to pay the journals to be published. Instead of access, the problem for poorer countries and universities shift to the ability of its researchers to pay for being published. Moreover, only 20% of the research content today is in such open access journals.

The three publishers have filed similar suits in other countries as well. But in India, it is not only a case of publishers’ vs SciHub/Libgen. Here there is a huge community of students, teachers, research scholars and scientists whose access to these journals and books would virtually end if the publishers get their prayer in court for dynamic blocking to these sites. There will be serious long term consequences to science and education in India.

It might be believed that Sci-Hub has no legal case in India. This is not true. Sci-Hub does not charge any student or researcher for downloads — it is a free service. So it is not profiting from making such papers available. Secondly, Indian copyright law has exceptions for education and research. It is for the Courts to decide whether Sc-Hub’s use by research scholars in India constitutes a valid use of the copyright exceptions, similar to what was argued and decided by the courts in the Delhi University photo-copying case. Blocking these websites will also mean that access to those publications which are under open access or not published by these publishers will also get blocked.  Finally, these copyright holders are sitting on content some of which is more than 60 years old and free from copyright in India. Yet we still have to pay money to access even this content.

The case filed by the copyright holders in Delhi High Court asking for a blanket ban of the sites is not against Sci-Hub and Libgen; it is against the research scholars in this country. Most of whose research would come to a halt if this case by the robber barons of the publishing industry succeeds. It is the future of research in India that is at stake, not Alexandra Elbakyan or Sci-Hub’s future.

AIPSN demands that the monopolistic model of access to knowledge be given up and the process of free access to knowledge by the public accepted.

AIPSN joins hands in support of those legally fighting these monopoly publishing industries against SciHub and Libgen which are working like the story figure of Robin Hood in making the knowledge commons work by providing the public a way to have their right to accessing knowledge.

 

Contact

Rajamanickam, General Secretary AIPSN

gsaipsn@gmail.com, 9442915101

Twitter @gsaipsn

 

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AIDWA and AIPSN to Launch Joint Campaign Against Misinformation around COVID-19 : From Newsclick

Read the newsclick story here

‘Under cover of the epidemic, attempts are being made by the Sangh Parivar to bolster socially conservative values, communal prejudices and patriarchal notions.’

The All-India Democratic Women’s Association (AIDWA) and the All India Peoples Science Network (AIPSN) will hold a joint campaign against the various superstitions and alleged cures which have been peddled for COVID-19, beginning July 23.

The campaign will kick off on Thursday, the death anniversary of Dr. Lakshmi Sahgal, a freedom-fighter and one of the founding members of AIDWA. Its last day, August 20, was the date on which “anti-superstition campaigner Dr. Narendra Dabholkar was murdered by right wing obscurantist forces,” the campaign note said.

The campaign is being launched at a time when solutions like banging plates and untested ayurvedic medicines are being touted as inhibitors or a cure for the novel coronavirus, vaccines for which are under development in various countries, including India.

“Many traditionalist practices which have no proven impact on COVID-19 are being advocated as cures or as having preventive properties. Under cover of the epidemic, attempts are being made by the Sangh Parivar to bolster socially conservative values, communal prejudices and patriarchal notions. This must be resisted unitedly by progressive and democratic forces,” the joint-campaign note said.

The note added that governments, except for Kerala, resorted to “knee-jerk” reactions and a “badly implemented” lockdown to contain COVID-19, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi led the way in exhorting citizens to clap and light diyas to contain the spread of the virus.

The organisations mention that the prescribed remedies included “a number of home remedies like drinking warm water, standing in the sun, growing certain plants at home and so on. Such untested beliefs gained considerable popularity until, under pressure from scientists and people’s organizations and movements, public messaging became more coherent and science-based.”

The note said that such ‘methods of treatment’ have been allowed to foster even by government representatives and spokespersons of the BJP. Such remedies also included Baba Ramdev’s Patanjali coming up with an alleged cure for COVID-19.

The organisations also mention that questionable practices have been adopted by people in states like Rajasthan, Bihar, Tamil Nadu, Odisha and Telangana. Citing attempts made by the right-wing to label the Tablighi Jamaat as a ‘super-spreader’ in the initial days of the COVID-19 fight, the note said that “any rational and unbiased person would understand that the problem is not with the particular religion, but with the practices adopted. Here obscurantist forces are deliberately fanning and spreading communal prejudice, while at the same time devaluing science and rational thought and distracting everyone from governments’ responsibility to provide quality medical care.”

“The campaign would resist attempts by the government and obscurantist forces to take us backwards, and instead uphold the values of secularism, gender justice, critical thinking and scientific temper, all of which are essential for building a forward-looking, democratic society,” the note added.

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Joint campaign by AIPSN-AIDWA: Science, not superstition, will help us tackle Covid-19

Science, not superstition, will help us tackle Covid-19.

Background note for a nation-wide AIDWA- AIPSN  campaign

 

Read here the campaign note in English , in Hindi 

Read here the Newsclick story on the joint campaign

 

On 23rd July 2020, All-India Democratic Women’s Association (AIDWA) is commemorating the eighth death anniversary of Captain Lakshmi Sahgal, the revolutionary freedom fighter and tireless campaigner for progressive ideals, democratic rights, gender justice, and an upholder of the scientific outlook throughout her life. She was one of the founding members of AIDWA in 1981, and played a crucial role in taking the organization into the Hindi heartland. As a doctor based in Kanpur, UP, her clinic was a nodal centre for the organization, attracting women seeking medical help and unable to afford it; as well as a site for interaction and meetings of activists. Fortunate were the thousands of babies delivered there, as the parents did not have to worry about becoming impoverished in the process!

 

The All India Peoples Science Network (AIPSN) comprising 37 OrganizatioWwAns all over India, joins AIDWA in remembering and celebrating the enormous contributions of Dr. Lakshmi Sahgal. Significantly, she played a leading role in the founding of the Network in 1987 and was a champion of the battle against obscurantism, and for promotion of scientific temper.

 

The life and work of Dr. Lakshmi Sahgal assumes even greater relevance during the on-going Covid-19 epidemic during which obscurantist forces are playing on the fears of the people, particularly women, to spread superstitions and pseudo-scientific beliefs. . Many traditionalist practices which have no proven impact on Covid-19 are being advocated as cures or as having preventive properties. Under cover of the epidemic, attempts are being made by the Sangh Parivar to bolster socially conservative values, communal prejudices and patriarchal notions. This must be resisted unitedly by  progressive and democratic forces.

 

The message of science

The Covid-19 pandemic hit India in January 2020, and presented a challenge in the early days even to public health experts, doctors and scientists who were still learning about the novel Corona Virus. The Central Government and most State Governments, with the notable exception of Kerala as recognized worldwide,  were quite late in putting together a  coherent, rational understanding and communicating it effectively to the people. A knee-jerk  and badly implemented lock down, dramatic gestures like lighting diyas, clapping, hands, etc, initiated by none other than the PM himself, did not help matters.

 

Not surprisingly, as people desperately sought relief and protection from Covid-19, all kinds of myths and beliefs proliferated to fill the gaps. These included a number of home remedies like drinking warm water, standing in the sun, growing certain plants at home and so on. Such untested beliefs gained considerable popularity until, under pressure from scientists and people’s organizations and movements, public messaging became more coherent and science-based. AIPSN and other organizations of scientists, doctors and public health experts have been at the forefront of informing the public about the correct do’s-and-don’ts related to Covid-19 derived from WHO and ICMR guidelines and expert opinion. A number of popular practices  and home remedies gain acceptance as remedies because in 80% of cases the disease is self-limiting and the patient recovers without much intervention. .

The challenge meanwhile is to stop obscurantist forces and vested interests from using the uncertainty which still prevails, to spread their ideology, and to make their profits. The promotion of do-it-yourself home remedies or traditionalist treatments combine with misleading messages that “no treatment is available for COVID 19” and to distract from the governments failures to provide affordable quality medical care through rapid expansion of public health services. Although there is as yet no curative allopathic medicine, the scientific and medical communities have learned much about the virus and its effects, and are applying this knowledge in testing and treatment of Covid-19, especially in hospital settings with or without oxygen or ventilator support. Further, the search for definitive treatments and vaccines for prevention continues with emphasis on scientific validation especially through clinical trials so as to ensure safety and efficacy.  This isthe scientific approach. Unfortunately, some treatments are pushed even within modern medicine, cutting short scientific procedures, by corporate interests and their supporters in positions of power or influence, motivated by greed for profits or misplaced national pride. The undue haste in pressurizing hospitals to unrealistically accelerate clinical trials of a vaccine candidate, perhaps just to enable a triumphant announcement from the red fort on Independence Day, is a case in point, thwarted only by concerted opposition by the scientific and medical communities and informed public opinion.

Countering pseudo remedies and false propaganda

Some false remedies and fake claims take the form of peddling Covid “cures” or “treatments” in the name of Ayurvedic, homeopathic or other traditional formulations. None of these have any foundation even within these traditions, nor have they been subject to any scientific trials. Yet many such claims have been allowed to propagate. Even some Ministers at the Centre and in several States have made such claims. When the Union Health Minister or leading Government spokespersons were challenged on such claims, they have shied away from outright debunking them, instead saying they may be the “personal beliefs” of those Ministers or leaders.

 

The atrocious and brazen claim of a supposed Ayurvedic “cure” from Baba Ramdev’s Patanjali conglomerate emerged from this trend. The formulation from the Sangh Parivar-linked, politically well-connected Baba was all set for commercial launch based on  spurious “clinical trials,” when a public outcry by scientists, doctors and informed citizens forced the  Health and AYUSH Ministries to debunk this claim and even declare readiness to invoke the law against “magical cures and remedies.” Nevertheless, many so-called immune-boosters and other concoctions to supposedly help people fight-off Covid-19 continue to be propagated, cleverly taking care only not to use the word “cure!”

 

Pseudo-scientific claims have got validated because the party in power and supporting social forces have gone along with such notions. The Prime Minister’s calls for people to come to balconies or doorsteps and clang vessels, and later to shine torches or light lamps, to express support for doctors and health workers, were followed by twitter storms and social media posts claiming that India’s anti-Covid lamps were seen from space by NASA, or that “powerful radiations” or “vibrations” from these public displays would destroy the Corona Virus! No efforts were made by any Government or Sangh Parivar leader to contradict any of these fantastic claims. (Suffice it to say that the virus continues to spread alarmingly!) These kind of claims are being used not just to magnify the PM’s “superpowers,” but also to undermine the influence of science, rationality and critical thinking in society.

The Sangh Parivar and linked forces have also used the Covid19 pandemic to spread communal poison. One highly regrettable mass religious gathering in Nizamuddin, which acted as a superspreader, was used systematically over several months to demonize a particular religious minority as the major cause behind the pandemic. This was carried forward to stigmatize the entire community by spreading false rumours that positive cases from this gathering were deliberately spitting on others to spread the virus, or that buying vegetables from vendors belonging to this community was dangerous etc. The simple fact is, as science teaches us, that it is not the religion that matters but that there was a large gathering, with no physical distancing or other precautions being taken. Indeed, a recent occurrence at arguably the most popular temple in the country where large numbers of priests and devotees have been infected, sharply underlines this fact.

 

The Sangh parivar and linked forces have been utilizing social media to propagate superstitions, communal, traditionalist and obscurantist beliefs in a big way, which have to be countered, through powerful media campaigns of our own based on science.

 

Unmasking the use of religion to reinforce patriarchy. 

The other dangerous development is the invocation of supposed religious beliefs to reinforce obscurantist views and customs, especially by giving it a gender twist, with the virus being personized as an angry goddess. Observations made by AIDWA activists from different states provide some disturbing instances of this growing trend.

In Rajasthan, some well-known temples were surreptitiously opened despite the government’s ban on opening places of worship, by spreading rumours that the doors of the temple had opened “by themselves” and people, especially women, should offer prayers there to “placate the Corona virus.” Women have been told to dip their hands in kumkum water, or in cow dung in UP, and put their imprints on the walls of their homes to pacify “Corona Mai (Devi).”        In parts of Bihar, women are being prompted to go to nearby rivers, dress up and carry sindoor, bindi, sweets etc and take a dip just as they would during Chhat Puja, to appease an angry “Corona mai.” In some places, women get “possessed” and exhort “Corona mai” to go away. Unfortunately, it is observed that women from Dalit and OBC families are especially influenced to act in this manner. The idea of an angry “Corona goddess” is also being propagated in Uttarakhand and West Bengal.

Such notions of an angry or dangerous Goddess who must be appeased have been witnessed earlier too in India. Small pox was associated with female Goddesses, for example Mariamma in Tamil Nadu, and the pox itself was known as “Mata/ Amma/Ammai etc,” as chicken pox, measles etc are often termed even today. Part of this derives from ancient quasi-religious beliefs but also stem from deep-rooted patriarchal culture and ideologies ascribing evil, dangerous and power-hungry characteristics to women as witches, daayin etc.

In Telangana, pro-Sangh Parivar forces, often led by women, are leading “prabhat pheris” or dawn marches, propagating the idea that the Covid epidemic has struck because women have stopped performing pujas and other sanskari or traditional practices, and calling on them to restart them so as to drive away the Corona Virus. The intention is clearly to reinforce traditional patriarchal culture with a subservient role chalked out for women within the lakshman rekha drawn around the home.

In Odisha, pro-Sangh Parivar outfits have been campaigning that temples should not have been closed, and that the Supreme Court did not permit the Rath Yatra because it is pro-Muslim and pro-Christian! In fact, places of worship of almost all religious denominations have been kept closed by the respective religious institutions themselves and by government guidelines.  Where this has not happened, or has happened without observance of physical distancing and hand-hygiene, it has resulted in Covid positive cases spreading from such gatherings. Any rational and unbiased person would understand that the problem is not with the particular religion, but with the practices adopted. Here obscurantist forces are deliberately fanning and spreading communal prejudice, while at the same time devaluing science and rational thought and distracting everyone from governments’ responsibility to provide quality medical care.

In this context, AIDWA and AIPSN would launch joint campaigns starting from 23 July 2020 to combat propagation of superstitions and irrational beliefs by obscurantist forces. We will take inspiration from great fighters like Captain Lakshmi Sahgal, to arm people with science as against superstition, and to demand that the scientific temper enshrined in the Constitution be widely promoted. The campaign would resist attempts by the government and obscurantist forces to take us backwards , and instead uphold the values of secularism, gender justice, critical thinking and scientific temper, all of which are essential for building a forward-looking, democratic society.

 

The Joint AIDWA-AIPSN Campaign would be conducted throughout the country from 23rd July 2020 at least till the National Scientific Temper Day on August 20, the black day on which anti-superstition campaigner Dr.Narendra Dabholkar was murdered by right wing obscurantist forces.

 

 

 

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Ask How Campaign 2019

Subka Desh Hamara Desh:

Ask How Campaign

The Ask How campaign  brings awareness to people about the rights that are enshrined in our constitution and how these constitutional rights are to be safeguarded from fundamentalist and neoliberal onslaught. 

 In Defense of the Republic:

Remembering Bose, Nehru, Ambedkar and Gandhi

The Constitution of India was passed in the Constituent Assembly on 26th November, and came into effect on 26th January 1950. The constitution declares India a sovereign, socialist, secular, democratic republic, assuring its citizens justice, equality and liberty, and endeavors to promote fraternity.

This meant that all sections of people – irrespective of race, religion or caste – had full rights to the nation, including the right to a decent standard of living, embedded in the Indian Constitution. It was for a secular India that Mahatma Gandhi was martyred. The secular republic, and democracy, both social and economic, are under threat today.
Dr.B.R.Ambedkar, in his speech to the Constituent Assembly made clear that democracy meant both social and economic democracy; without this, democracy would only be in name. He stated in his Address to the Constituent Assembly, 1949:

“In politics we will have equality and in social and economic life we will have inequality. In Politics we will be recognizing the principle of one man one vote and one vote one value. In our social and economic life, we shall, by reason of our social and economic structure, continue to deny the principle of one man one value. How long shall we continue to live this life of contradictions?”

It is this vision of economic democracy that united Jawaharlal Nehru and Subhash Chandra Bose with Dr.Ambedkar. In their vision, planning and building a public sector was an absolute necessity not for just industrial and agricultural regeneration of India, but also re-distributing the benefits of development to all sections of its people. It is only by state intervention in the economy that an independent India would be able to free India from absolute poverty, famine, abysmal life expectancy and illiteracy that the British colonial rule had imposed on India.

Let us remember all the four stalwarts of our Republic – Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Dr. Ambedkar, and Subhash Chandra Bose – in the week of 23rd January, Subhash Bose’s Birthday, to 30th January, when Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated by Godse. It is important for us to remember these four leaders for what they represent:  a truly democratic, secular republic. Particularly, when we see violent attacks on minorities and dalits, with tacit or, open support of the government. The All India Peoples Science Network will campaign with the people on the promise of secular democratic republic that the national movement had created, and oppose all attempts to derail it.

We see repeated attempts to pit Ambedkar, Bose, Patel and Gandhi against Nehru. Sections that do this, believe that our memories are weak, and that we have forgotten our past. Yes, of course all these leaders had differences among themselves. They were leaders with strong views, and were willing to disagree, sometimes sharply with each other, on the direction that the national movement should take. But unlike leaders in the RSS–Hindu Mahasabha, the ideological founders of the BJP, and the Muslim League, they all fought against the British for an independent India.

Bose mentions contemptuously how the Hindu Mahasabha and the Muslim League were pro-British, and kept themselves out of the national struggle. He and Nehru believed in planning and in science to lift India out of its desperate poverty. Both drew inspiration from the socialist experiment in Russia, which in two decades, had lifted it out of extreme backwardness, and turned into a modern nation. They were both deeply secular and socialistic in their outlook. Nehru, unlike Bose, was clear about the threat that fascist forces represented to the world. Bose saw the Axis powers as an enemy’s enemy – the British was his main enemy – and was willing to ally temporarily with them. But unlike the RSS–Hindu Mahashba, they were united in their vision of planning the economy, economic democracy and science in a free India. Not in mumbo jumbo science, which our council of ministers led by the PM, seems to believe.

The Planning Commission carried forward the vision of the Planning Committee, set up by Bose as the President of the Indian National Congress in 1938, and headed by Nehru. Its winding up and replacement by a think-tank called Niti Ayog, is an indication that economic democracy is no longer on the agenda of the current BJP-led NDA government. Lest we forget, Bose, as much as Nehru, was an ardent believer in planning, and talked about the need for a Planning Commission to guide the government in an independent India.

The other two planks of Indian national movement and democracy were its outlook to religious minorities and dalits. Ambedkar, Bose, Nehru and Gandhi, all believed that India must be a secular republic for all its people. Let us not forget that the Indian constitution was opposed bitterly by the RSS that had argued that India should have a constitution based on Manusmriti – India’s ancient legal text. That Manusmriti is the basic text of a caste divided society, and incorporates inequality between castes, and men and women in its core. The RSS and the Jana Sangh ridiculed Ambedkar, calling him a Lilliput, while extolling Manu and Manusmriti. The Organizer, the mouthpiece of the RSS, had stated in its November 30, 1949 issue:
“The worst about the new constitution  of Bharat is that there is nothing Bhartiya about it. The drafters of the Constitution have incorporated in it elements of British, American, Canadian, Swiss and sundry other constitutions… But in our constitution, there is no mention of the unique constitutional development in ancient Bharat. Manu’s Laws were written long before Lycurgus of Sparta or Solon of Persia. To this day his laws as enunciated in the Manusmriti excite the admiration of the world and elicit spontaneous obedience and conformity. But to our constitutional pundits that means nothing.”

It is not surprising that the other development of the Indian Constitution of affirmative action, namely reservation, in education and employment, was opposed by the RSS. Even today, the RSS leaders speak against reservation, that it promotes separatism and how it should be wound up.

The recent attacks on minorities and Dalits, the movement to project the lives of cows being far more important than that of human beings, is an attack on our secular and democratic values. It is the same forces that attack minorities that also attack reservation, women’s right to love and marry freely, and the way we want to live. Every facet of our culture and democracy is today under attack, from freedom of speech to the right to practice our religion and our culture.

This is not just an attack on our minorities. These attacks are taking place when India has again become as unequal as it was under the British; or what the French economist Piketty called it: from British Raj to Billionaire Raj. When crony capitalism is ruling the country; where 1% of people own wealth equal to 73% of Indians. There is an attack on the fundamental constitutional values of the republic – social and economic democracy, and no discrimination against any section of society based on caste or creed. This is what we have to fight against, this is our battle for a sovereign, socialist, secular democratic republic that our forefathers fought for during the independence movement.