TMS-the uncrowned king of Tamil Music passed away!!!

T.M. Soundararajan who articulated the joys and sorrows of millions of film-goers through his songs, and his lilting voice which charmed fans of South Indian films for more than 60 years are no more. The passing away of TMS, the uncrowned king of South Indian Cinema, marks the end of a golden era of South Indian music. He could infuse the right shade of emotion into every song, whether it was a melody, a comic or pathos song, a dance number, a fast song or a devotional one. The earthy, unbridled vivacity of TMS’s voice ruled the hearts of music lovers in the 60s and 70s to prepare a solid ground for playback singing in South India. May it be the rustic tinge of “Avalukenna azhagia mugam,” “Naan Paarthathiley Aval Oruthiyaithaan,” or the sophisticated strains like Aaru Maname Aaru Antha, Achcham Embadu, Adho Andha Paravai Pola, Amaidhikku Perdhan Shanti, Aval Paranthu Ponalay, Azhagiya Thamizh Magal Ival, Dharumam Thalaikakum, Enge Nimmathi, Inda Punnaghai Yenna, Irandu Manam Venum, Kadavul Yen Kallanaar, Malargalai Pol Yhangai, Naan Malarodu Thaniyaga, or the devotional tunes like Thiruchendhooril kadalorathil, Mannanalum Thiruchendooril, TMS alone could render it with the required joie de vivre. TMS had also made his mark by singing non-filmy song for Tamil Semmozhi Conference. These songs will remain as his rich legacy for posterity. Though the legendary TMS has left us physically, he will continue to live in the hearts of millions of his fans across the nation through his immortal songs. TMS’ death is an irreparable loss, a void which will be difficult to fill.

When the state itself is biased, where is the dawn?

My Letter to The Hindu dated 22-05-2013

This refers to report “Where protectors couldn’t transcend gender” (May 21). The dismissal of a transgender from the Tamil Nadu police points to the discrimination that characterises the life of the transgender community and deprives it of the fundamental right to life with dignity. The dismissal is a violation of Articles 14 and 15 of the Constitution. It is unfair and unwarranted on the part of the government to deprive the transgenders of their right to employment on the basis of gender.

The issue of access to justice and social inclusion of transgenders should be made a rights issue. The government should consider them the third gender with entitlements, including the right to property and inheritance as seen in many progressive countries.

For your Reading, The Hindu Report (21-05-2013)
When Protectors couldn't transcend gender

Joining the police force was a dream come true for this promising athlete from Villupuram district in Tamil Nadu. But the joy did not last long as she was dismissed from service a couple of months later. Reason: it was found during a routine medical check that she was a transgender.

Hailing from a poor family — her father works as a scavenger in the local municipality — the constable tried her best to convince police officials that she would produce results on a par with their expectations, but in vain. The department made it clear that the force could accommodate either men or women, but there was no place for the third gender.

She had a good track record in sports, NCC and academics. She performed well in the written examination, physical test and personal interview and was selected for the post of Grade-II police constable. “Women police recruits have to undergo a medical check for pregnancy. During this exercise, it was found that this particular constable was a transgender. She had qualified based on the physical standards set for women. After a preliminary enquiry, the person was dismissed from service,” a senior police official told The Hindu.

The woman participated in State-level athletic meets and bagged several medals. On hearing the news, her shocked parents appealed to the Superintendent of Police not to make public the reason for her dismissal.

This is not the first time that a transgender who made it to the force was unable to function. “Santhi Soundararajan, who made the country proud by winning a silver medal at the Asian Games in Doha, also qualified for appointment in the police department. Despite repeated reminders from the Police Training College, she did not join duty. Perhaps, she was scared that her gender might cost her the job someday…,” the officer said. Santhi had failed a gender test and lost her silver medal.

V. Suresh, advocate and human rights activist, said it was grossly unfair that a person who qualified for a post should be denied the opportunity and penalised for what nature had given to that person. “This is also arbitrary and goes against Constitutional principles. Article 15 provides for social justice in the context of people suffering discrimination. Transgenders squarely fall under this category, though the term was not used when the Constitution was written. The very spirit of Article 15 is to undo discrimination by providing reservation.”

Saying that Tamil Nadu was in the forefront in devising social policies, Dr. Suresh, who is also the national general secretary of PUCL, wanted the state to take a stand on the issue of transgenders and render justice by accommodating them as a category in education and employment.

According to Vikranth Prasanna, founder of ‘Chennai Dost’, which supports the LGBT community in Tamil Nadu, there was a need for a support system to educate and empower transgenders. “We appreciate the initiative of the Dindigul Collector who gave a job to a transgender in a Government Hospital. We hear that students were sent out of colleges when their gender transformation became visible. Even in a popular IT firm, a well-qualified transgender was asked to leave,” he said.

This kind of discrimination would only force transgenders to indulge in commercial sex or resort to begging. “If livelihood is not guaranteed even to the qualified ones, where will they go?” he asked.

A National Shame goes unnoticed

The grim fact that Suicide rates among Indian farmers were a chilling 47 per cent higher than they were for the rest of the population in 2011 proves yet again that no government whether at the Centre or in the states has taken a serious note of it. The tragic cases of farmers and marginal farm labourers committing suicides due to agrarian crises are heart-rending. Despite the tall claims of containing the crisis by the Central and State governments after initiating a number of ad-hoc measures such as interest waiver, moratorium on debts, waiver of electricity dues, providing free power for agriculture use, streamlining seed supply etc., farmers' suicides still continue unabated.

India is predominantly an agriculture-based country where the economy revolves around agriculture. Though the government claims to have taken steps in this regard, it seems that except recording that too under-recording cases of suicides by farmers, nothing worthwhile has been done to alleviate their sufferings. The root cause for suicides lies in the fact that agriculture is increasingly becoming unprofitable in the backdrop of liberalization. Suicides by farmers and their families on account of their inability to repay the loans paint a sad picture. There has been little amelioration in the status and living standards of farmers who are left to face the vagaries of life. Even after more than six decades of Independence farmers’ lifestyle has hardly undergone any change. Fragmentation, depletion and fast conversion of agricultural land into urban land have considerably reduced their holdings besides depleting their source of income. Rise in prices of daily commodities is eating up a sizeable chunk of the earnings of a farmer.

The state governments in cooperation with the Centre must prepare a substantial action plan. The small farmers should be helped with adequate subsidies, quality seeds, marketing facilities, free quality education, health services and all other possible facilities. The Governments should liberate them from all types of loans without any condition further encouraging agro-based industries. It is time the governments took effective steps. Otherwise the hands that feed the entire nation will no longer be there. 

For your Reading The Hindu Report (18-05-2013)

Farmers’ suicide rates soar above the rest

Suicide rates among Indian farmers were a chilling 47 per cent higher than they were for the rest of the population in 2011. In some of the States worst hit by the agrarian crisis, they were well over 100 per cent higher. The new Census 2011 data reveal a shrinking farmer population. And it is on this reduced base that the farm suicides now occur.

Apply the new Census totals to the suicide data of the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) and the results are grim. Sample: A farmer in Andhra Pradesh is three times more likely to commit suicide than anyone else in the country, excluding farmers. And twice as likely to do so when compared to non-farmers in his own State. The odds are not much better in Maharashtra, which remained the worst State for such suicides across a decade.

“The picture remains dismal,” says Prof. K. Nagaraj, an economist at the Asian College of Journalism, Chennai. Prof. Nagaraj's 2008 study on farm suicides in India remains the most important one on the subject. “The intensity of farm suicides shows no real decline,” he says. “Nor do the numbers show a major fall. They remain concentrated in the farming heartlands of five key States. The crisis there continues. And the adjusted farmers’ suicide rate for 2011 is in fact slightly higher than it was in 2001.” And that’s after heavy data fudging at the State level.

Five States account for two-thirds of all farm suicides in the country, as NCRB data show. These are Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. The share of these ‘Big 5’ in total farm suicides was higher in 2011 than it was in 2001. At the same time, the new Census data show that four of these States have far fewer farmers than they did a decade ago. Only Maharashtra reports an increase in their numbers.

Nationwide, the farmers’ suicide rate (FSR) was 16.3 per 100,000 farmers in 2011. That’s a lot higher than 11.1, which is the rate for the rest of the population. And slightly higher than the FSR of 15.8 in 2001.

In Maharashtra, for instance, the rate is 29.1 suicides per 100,000 farmers (‘Main cultivators’). Which is over 160 per cent higher than that for all Indians excluding farmers. Such gaps exist in other States, too. In as many as 16 of 22 major States, the farm suicide rate was higher than the rate among the rest of the population (RRP) in 2011.

The data for 2011 are badly skewed, with States like Chhattisgarh declaring ‘zero’ farm suicides that year. The same State reported an increase in total suicides that same year. But claimed that not one of these was a farmer. What happens if we take the average number of farm suicides reported by the State in three years before 2011? Then Chhattisgarh’s FSR is more than 350 per cent higher than the rate among the rest of the country’s population.

In 1995, the ‘Big 5’ accounted for over half of all farm suicides in India. In 2011, they logged over two-thirds of them. Given this concentration, even the dismal all-India figures tend to make things seem less terrible than they are.

Ten States show a higher farm suicide rate in 2011 than in 2001. That includes the major farming zones of Punjab and Haryana. The average farm suicide rate in the ‘Big 5’ is slightly up, despite a decline in Karnataka. And also a fall in Maharashtra. The latter has the worst record of any State. At least 53,818 farmers’ suicides since 1995. So how come it shows a lower FSR now?

Well, because Census 2011 tells us the State has added 1.2 million farmers (‘main cultivators’) since 2001. That’s against a nationwide decline of 7.7 million in the same years. So Maharashtra’s farm suicide rate shows a fall. Yet, its farm suicide numbers have not gone down by much. And a farmer in this State is two-and-a-half times more likely to kill himself than anyone else in the country, other than farmers.

Karnataka, in 2011, saw a lot less of farm suicides than it did a decade ago. And so, despite having fewer farmers than it did in 2001, the State shows a lower FSR. Yet, even the ‘lower’ farm suicide rates in both Maharashtra and Karnataka are way above the rate for the rest of the country.

These figures are obtained by applying the new farm population totals of Census 2011 to farm suicide numbers of the NCRB. The Census records cultivators. The police count suicides. In listing suicides, the State governments and police tend to count only those with a title to land as farmers.

“Large numbers of farm suicides still occur,” says Prof. Nagaraj. “Only that seems not to be recognised, officially and politically. Is the ‘conspiracy of silence’ back in action?” A disturbing trend has gained ground with Chhattisgarh’s declaration of ‘zero’ farm suicides. (That’s despite having had 4,700 in 36 months before the ‘zero’ declaration). Puducherry has followed suit. Others will doubtless do the same. Punjab and Haryana have in several years claimed ‘zero’ women farmers’ suicides. (Though media and study reports in the same years suggest otherwise). This trend must at some point fatally corrupt the data.

At least 270,940 Indian farmers have taken their lives since 1995, NCRB records show. This occurred at an annual average of 14,462 in six years, from 1995 to 2000. And at a yearly average of 16,743 in 11 years between 2001 and 2011. That is around 46 farmers’ suicides each day, on average. Or nearly one every half-hour since 2001.

A moderate voice of Islam is no more

Noted Islamic scholar Asghar Ali Engineer today passed away here after a prolonged illness.Born in 1940, he did BSc in civil engineering from Vikram University. From 1980, he edited a journal ‘The Islamic Perspective’ and during the 1980s he published a string of books on Islam and communal violence in India, the latter based on his field investigations in post-independence India.

In 1987, he received the Distinguished Service Award from the USA International Student Assembly and the USA Indian Student Assembly.In 1990, he received the Dalmia Award for communal harmony and was the recipient of three honorary doctorate degrees.The destruction of the Babri Mosque in 1992 provided the impetus for the foundation by Engineer in 1993 of the Centre for Study of Society and Secularism (CSSS), of which he was the Chairman and which was the organisational focus of his work since then. He published 52 books, many papers and articles, including those for scholarly journals. He edited the ‘Indian Journal of Secularism’, and a monthly paper, Islam and Modern Age. He also published Secular Perspective every fortnight.

Engineer received several awards, including the National Communal Harmony Award in 1997, and the USA Award from the Association for Communal Harmony in Asia in 2003. Engineer was a Bohra Muslim, and an important component of his work was to promote a better understanding of Islam and to critique some of its manifestations from the inside (for example, Rethinking Issues in Islam in 1998). His progressive interpretation of the scriptures often brought him into a conflict with the orthodox clergy. After 2001, some of Engineer’s work addressed the issues of globalisation, Islam and terrorism, but most of his work remained focused on the communal situation in India and, to a lesser extent, its relations with Pakistan.

My heartfelt condolences!!

Dr.Ramadoss should stop his anti-Dalit rhetoric!!!

Our heads must hang in shame over the shocking spurt in crimes against Dalits in Tamilnadu which finds its genesis in an archaic patriarchal structure. Mere words cannot adequately convey the outrage over the medieval act of vengeance carried out in the heart of Tamilnadu where the three Dalit villages were set on fire by a mob of upper-caste men merely because an upper-caste boy eloped with a relatively upper caste girl. The grossly disproportionate reaction was evidently inspired by caste considerations and wounded pride. While the armed mob went on the rampage and set the thatched tenements on fire, most people managed to escape but their certificates, property documents and valuables were destroyed. In yet another incident that occurred in Marakkanam village of Villupuram dalits were targeted by the dominant caste groups who were on their way to Mammallapuram.  In all these cases of endemic violence, the sharp reaction against the political ascendancy of dalits is visible. These shameful incidents show up the weaknesses of both the administration and civil society. The administration clearly had no clue about the simmering tension in these villages or about the immediate provocation. The Pattali Makkal Katchi and the civil society too cannot be absolved of their responsibility. The absence of any restraining influence and lack of sane advice reflect poorly on the dominant community mobs as they torch the state owned buses and government properties. Growing assertiveness of the dalits following their political and economic empowerment, and the corresponding loss of clout of the upper-castes, seem to be at the root of the conflict. In all acts of mob violence, it is certainly difficult to judge the specific role played by individuals and apportion responsibility. Most perpetrators take advantage of this lacuna to claim innocence and get off lightly. Justice, however, demands exemplary and swift punishment to the entire group because any delay or prevarication would continue to encourage unruly mobs to take the law into their own hands.

Caste-based atrocities in Tamilnadu are in a sharp contrast to both its anti-Brahmanical Dravidian politics and its rapid pace of modernisation and urbanisation. It is a fact that the increasing empowerment of Dalits has not been liked and approved of by the dominant castes in the villages. In the recent years, attacks on Dalits have increased manifold. Dalits are not given their due share after centuries of oppression and that has led to growing resentment. The growing impatience of dominant caste groups to corner maximum benefits further sharpened the contestation of power. The feudal tendency with a patriarchal mind- set has seen resurrection of traditional Khap panchayats. The young boys and girls going for the marriage of their own choice have invited the ire of the traditional custodians of caste pride. Both communities are asserting their cultural identities and space. A major reason for the unabated atrocities on Dalits is that the ruling and major Opposition parties in Tamilnadu are dominated by the landowning upper castes who have kept mum on the atrocious diktats of the kangaroo courts. In addition to the apathetic approach of the political parties, the strong caste divide among the Scheduled Castes has weakened their resistance to fight the age-old repression by the dominating caste forces. The vote bank politics does not allow the state to take strong measures against the violence unleashed by the dominant castes. The soft pedaling of issues and constant desire to appease different sections allow the people to regroup along the caste lines. These issues have further eroded a situation of caste and communal harmony in Tamilnadu. Despite the fact that India has some substantial laws to check crime against Dalits, the unchanging feudal mindset of people and the lack of political will to implement the laws have not yet been able to liberate dalits from caste based atrocities. Instead of treating the Dalits as mere vote banks, the political parties should try to inculcate traits of neutrality, accountability, responsibility and humanity in its infrastructure. Also, the Dalits should be merged with the mainstream. The inflammatory statements of Dr. Ramadoss and his party men are tantamount to sedition. Dr. Ramadoss should be tried in a court of law and the election commission should ban his party. If no immediate preventive steps are taken, the downtrodden section of society would continue to suffer. How long will Dalits put up with humiliation and injustice?