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Saturday, March 20, 2010

[ZESTCaste] Fwd: Journalism College Chief's request concerning the SC/ST scholarships at the ACJ

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: CHITTIBABU PADAVALA <afchittibabu@gmail.com>
Date: Sat, Mar 20, 2010 at 12:14 AM
Subject: Journalism College Chief's request concerning the SC/ST
scholarships at the ACJ
To: "humanhorizons@yahoogroups.co.uk cc Vidyadhar Landge"
<vidyadhar.landge@gmail.com>, bahujanstudentnetwork@googlegroups.com,
sakyagroup@yahoogroups.com, buddhistcircle Group
<BuddhistCircle@yahoogroups.com>, mulnivasibahujans
<MulnivasiBahujans@googlegroups.com>

Please do kindly go through this mail and tell me what you think we
should collectively do about increasing the presence of Dalits in
media and media studies. Suggestions, criticisms, and offers of help
are welcome.
This is from Mr. Sashikumar, one of the most important figures in
modern Indian Media and also journalism education and the founder of
Asian College of Journalism. He expressed his disappointment that not
many applications are coming from Dalits to study at ACJ and thinks it
was not due to any dearth of talent but ........
Chittibabu.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: sashikumar <sakumar@vsnl.com>
Date: 19 March 2010 09:21
Subject: Reg: SC/ST scholarships at the ACJ
To: CHITTIBABU PADAVALA <afchittibabu@gmail.com>
Cc: Malini <malini.acj@gmail.com>

Dear Chittibabu,

I write to you to seek your assistance in meaningfully enabling and
enlarging the scholarships we have instituted for candidates from
Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes for study at the ACJ.

As you know, the intent and purpose of these scholarships are threefold:
(a) to make the composition of our student intake for our postgraduate
diploma programme each year more diverse and inclusive,
(b) to bring the impinging inequality, injustice and deprivation in
our society - which tends to be marginalised in the mainstream news
media - in sharp focus into our radar; and thereby
(c) make for a demographic change in the class and caste character of
practising professional journalists.

I have no doubt that to realise these aims we must be able to draw the
attention of talented candidates from the Scheduled Castes and
Scheduled Tribes, who see in journalism the potential to make a
difference.
Unfortunately our experience over the last years has been that there
are not enough applications to select candidates from for the four
scholarships we already have. These are, as you know, full
scholarships covering the tuition fees and, wherever required, also
the board and lodging for the duration of the course.

In fact ,the paradox has been that while we have offers of more
scholarships (beyond the 4 already available) we find we do not have
enough takers for them. This may partly have to do with the
requirement that candidates must have a comfortable functional grasp
of English to cope with the programme., which is tested in ACJ's
entrance exam for admissions. But I suspect the real reason for the
inadequate response to our scholarship scheme is that we have not
really been able to connect with, and interest, the target group which
can beneficially avail it.

As a scholar-alumnus of ACJ, I hope your own experience will bear out
the value of the course in equipping students with the skill sets and
the analytical and reflective capabilities for professional
journalistic practice.

I rely on you to try and initiate interest in these scholarships so
that we have a talented pool of applicants to draw from, and can
really make the difference we hope to.

Admissions for the academic year 2010-2011 have been announced and the
details are available on the ACJ websites: www.asianmedia.org or
www.asianmedia.org.in

Please do spread the word to your ACJ mates and other collegaues and
enlist their support in this cause. If there is anything you think we
should do to facilitate the process, please don't hesitate to let me
know.
The ACJ Registrar, Ms. Malini ( malini.acj@gmail.com) can also be
contacted for any clarifications in this regard.

I hope we will be able to make a break through this year.

With warm wishes,

Sashi

Sashi Kumar
Chairman
Media Development Foundation
&
Asian College of Journalism
Second Main Road
Taramani
Chennai-600113
India
(T) +91-44-22542840 / 42-47
(F) +91-44-22542839
www.asianmedia.org

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[ZESTCaste] Will torch myself if not given a home, says poor Dalit

http://www.bombaynews.net/story/614142

Will torch myself if not given a home, says poor Dalit
Bombay News.Net
Saturday 20th March, 2010 (IANS)

Many rural poor are upset over alleged corruption in getting houses
under a central government scheme and a 30-year-old Dalit woman has
threatened to set herself on fire if she does not get a home due to
her.

Ramvati Devi, a resident of Begusarai district, has threatened to set
herself on fire April 1 if she is not provided a house under the
Indira Awas Yojana (IAY) before that. She says her name was in the
2008 waiting list of the scheme.

'I will set myself on fire to protest injustice. I am a victim of
injustice and corruption in the scheme.

'I have informed the block official that my name was in the waiting
list of 2008 but I have been deprived of a house till date. I have
petitioned the block development officer that I will immolate if not
provided a house before April 1,' Ramvati told IANS.

Bihar Rural Development Minister Bhagwan Singh Kushwaha admitted to
corruption in IAY scheme and said the state government had taken steps
to weed out corruption.

'There is no doubt that there is corruption in the scheme. We are
taking the necessary preventive steps,' Kushwaha told IANS.

He said as against the target of construction of houses under IAY at
an estimated cost of Rs.2,120.50 crore during 2008-09, a total of 4.68
lakh houses were constructed for the below poverty line (BPL) families
which was 77.31 percent of the target.

Ramvati also accused village body head Runa Devi of demanding bribes
for a house under the scheme.

'I gave Rs.3,000 to Renu Devi in 2008. But she and her husband Hira
Sahni demanded Rs.3,000 more. I refused to pay as I did not have
money. After I refused to give more bribe to Renu Devi, my dream of a
house remains a dream,' she said.

Ramvati Devi's fight has exposed the rampant corruption in the
execution of IAY in the state. 'Corruption rules the roots in IAY
scheme in Bihar. Poor people are badly hit by it,' Rashtriya Janata
Dal (RJD) state president Abdul bari Siddiqui said.

Siddiqui, a senior legislator, said local officials and village body
heads demand money from poor for a house under IAY. 'Despite knowing
it, the state government has not initiated any step to check
corruption and punish officials and village body heads for it.'

Three days ago, Bihar Assembly witnessed uproarious scenes with the
opposition alleged corruption in the execution of IAY and staged a
walkout.

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[ZESTCaste] Rahul on road to crack UP Dalit base

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1100320/jsp/nation/story_12240328.jsp

Rahul on road to crack UP Dalit base
OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

Rahul Gandhi
New Delhi, March 19: Having shattered Mayavati's exceptional axis with
Brahmins, the Congress has now drawn up an ambitious plan to make
inroads into her Dalit vote bank. The plan will be unveiled on April
14, the birth anniversary of Dalit icon B.R. Ambedkar.

That day, Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi will flag off 10
yatras which will cover the entire Uttar Pradesh and carry the message
of the state's abysmal decline under different regimes that the party
believes didn't focus on development.

The yatras will also dwell on the welfare programmes of the UPA and
stress that the Centre's ruling coalition is primarily driven by
inclusive politics.

Rahul will reach Ambedkarnagar, near Faizabad, on April 14 to flag off
the yatras, each of which will cover 40 Assembly constituencies and
culminate on November 10 in Allahabad, where Congress president Sonia
Gandhi will be present. The Congress is also keen to rekindle the
glory of the freedom movement through the yatras. A programme has been
lined up at Allahabad's Anand Bhavan, the Gandhis' ancestral home.

AICC general secretary in charge of Uttar Pradesh, Digvijay Singh, and
secretary Avinash Pandey will coordinate the yatras, to be in two
phases — first from April 14 to May 31 and the second from September
15 to November 10.

Each yatra will have a chief co-ordinator who, in turn, will appoint
co-ordinators for each Assembly constituency. Senior leaders, central
ministers and even chief ministers of Congress-ruled states will be
invited to address the meetings.

The 10 chief co-ordinators are Jagdambika Pal, P.L. Puniya, Zafar Ali
Naqvi, Shekhar Bahuguna, Rajeshpati Tripathi, Rajendra Sharma, Pradeep
Mathur, Ranjit Singh Judeo, Bhola Pandey and Praveen Aaron.

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[ZESTCaste] Identity politics alone won’t do

http://www.dailypioneer.com/243363/Identity-politics-alone-won%E2%80%99t-do.html

Saturday, March 20, 2010 New Delhi Today's Issue

Identity politics alone won't do

Ashok Malik

In the past few days, Ms Mayawati's "garland of currency notes" and
police inquiry into an alleged bee attack on a BSP public meeting in
Lucknow have brought the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister into the centre
of a fascinating debate on attitudes.

Her adherents and sections of 'progressive' intellectuals have
contended Ms Mayawati's ostentation has to be seen in the context of
the oppression of Dalits for thousands of years. When the ordinary
Dalit observes Ms Mayawati's grand statues, lavish birthday parties
and currency-note indulgences, he apparently experiences a sense of
pride. He feels, so the argument goes, the equal of upper caste folk
whose political leaders have been behaving thus for years.

Such analysis is not new. It has been with us for over a decade and is
wheeled out each time Ms Mayawati's public persona is discussed. A
degree of political correctness and squeamishness takes over and many
observers tend to be lenient with the BSP's garishness and display of
wealth in a manner they simply wouldn't be if it came to another
party.

It is true aesthetic subjectivities cannot and should not come in the
way of cold political assessment. Ms Mayawati's shiny salwar kameez
may not appeal to somebody who prefers south Delhi chic but it still
may represent aspirational taste in a more humble, hinterland setting.

Likewise, the massive BSP construction projects in Uttar Pradesh —
Lucknow probably matches Pyongyang in the number of statues of an
incumbent head of Government — can be reckoned to be only a more
visible, in-your-face perpetuation of cultism. An alternative,
subliminal system, perfected by the Congress, would be to name every
programme, organisation, building, memorial and institution after
members of the Nehru-Gandhi family.

Having said that, the defence of Ms Mayawati's excesses only on the
basis of past precedents (of other parties) or past injustice done to
Dalits is beginning to look a little tired and ragged. It was fine in
her earlier terms and when she became Chief Minister in 1995 or again
in 1997. Yet, after her decisive victory in the 2007 Assembly
election, surely the frame of reference has changed?

All effective politics is a combination of bread and circus. Ms
Mayawati's continued emphasis on the circus aspect even after winning
a majority in the 2007 election does indicate an inability to make a
critical evolution in her politics. She has been the unquestioned boss
of Uttar Pradesh for three years now, unencumbered by difficult
alliance partners and free from political blackmail by independent
MLAs. Yet, she has not made good governance or an alternative
development paradigm her calling card.

This is certainly a failing and it would be dishonest to not recognise
it — or to confuse criticism of it with upper caste/urban hostility to
the BSP. Indeed Ms Mayawati won so handsomely in 2007 precisely
because a game-changing mass of upper caste (primarily Brahmin) voters
across Uttar Pradesh turned to her. She won not just because of her
strong Dalit constituency but thanks to the formidable rainbow
coalition she put together.

Identity politics makes for great theatre. It absorbs political
observers and journalists and becomes a self-contained universe of its
own. Yet, in the broader community, beyond merely the politically
obsessive, identity politics can only occasionally be an end in
itself.

There are essentially two templates for Ms Mayawati to choose from.
She can turn to Gujarat and Bihar. In their own ways, both Mr Narendra
Modi and Mr Nitish Kumar have made the transformation from identity
politics to good governance.

This doesn't mean they have completely given up on identity. Mr Kumar
is still very much a Kurmi leader and sees himself as part of the
OBC/social justice movement. Mr Modi self-identifies as a confident
Hindu and a pillar of Gujarati pride. Yet, with good governance, they
have added value to their individual brand. The mix has given their
politics a greater robustness, one that stressing on identity alone
would not have achieved.

The other model is that of Mr Lalu Prasad Yadav. He premised his
entire politics on identity. When it ran its course, when those
energies were expended, he had no back-up plan, nothing else to offer
the voter. As such, the RJD's collapse in Bihar has been precipitous.

Today, Mr Lalu Prasad Yadav is a desperate man, working fervently to
reignite the Muslim-Yadav alliance using the women's reservation
issue, trying to stay in the running in the Bihar Assembly election
later this year. He realises if he loses this round as well his career
is more or less over. In one decade, he has gone from being
invulnerable to completely vulnerable. That is the huge gamble of an
identity-only political platform.

What message does this hold for Ms Mayawati? If she wins the Assembly
election of 2012 — or even if the BSP finishes as the single largest
party, well ahead of others in a hung House — would it mean her statue
symbolism, the corruption allegations against her, the sudden and
dramatic acquisition of property, doesn't matter to the voter? Would
it imply the (Dalit) voter is happy enough with circus to not bother
about bread?

That would be a cynical and extremely superficial assumption. If Ms
Mayawati is still a force to reckon with in Uttar Pradesh, it is for
two reasons. First, the social coalition she shaped before the 2007
election is still largely intact. There is a movement of Muslims
towards the Congress. Brahmins and the urban middle classes have also
turned in that direction. Even so, the shift hasn't been complete and
absolute. Rather, it has created a situation where State politics has
devolved into a two-horse race.

Second, the Mayawati Government's biggest plus point is simply that it
is not the Mulayam Singh Yadav Government. Memories of Mulayam raj are
still strong across towns of Uttar Pradesh and they are not pleasant
ones. Large parts of the State remain lawless; corruption, with
accusations right to the top, remains a concern. Yet, the perception
that the Government itself is hand-in-glove with criminal syndicates
and mafia dons, and the ruling party is a mechanism for crony
capitalism — charges that dogged the Mulayam Singh Yadav Government —
are not quite as strong today. As Chief Minister, Ms Mayawati is not
so much good as simply less bad.

As can be imagined, this is very different from an endorsement of her
identity politics, much less of her astonishing income tax returns.

-- malikashok@gmail.com

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[ZESTCaste] Outfit seeks separate state for dalits

http://www.expressbuzz.com/edition/story.aspx?Title=Outfit+seeks+separate+state+for+dalits&artid=gBGfWgtmCpk=&SectionID=mvKkT3vj5ZA=&MainSectionID=fyV9T2jIa4A=&SectionName=nUFeEOBkuKw=&SEO=

By Express News Service
20 Mar 2010 08:39:21 AM IST

Outfit seeks separate state for dalits

BHUBANESWAR: The State Ambedkar Chinta- Chetana Parishad, an
organisation of tribals and dalits, has demanded a separate state for
the two backward sections of the society.
The working president of the organisation Debaraj Naik has said in a
statement that the separate state should be created with 40 percent of
the land of Orissa.
He has threatened that if the State Government failed to fulfil the
demand, the Parishad will launched a statewide agitation to press for
it.
The demand for the separate state has been made before the State
Government and the Centre.
Naik said that a meeting of tribals and dalits have been convened here
on March 28 to discuss the issue and take necessary steps.
Criticising the State Government for shedding crocodile's tears over
the plight of the people of these backward sections, the Parishad
alleged that in name of education, the tribal girls have been pushed
to sexual exploitation.
He alleged that the constitutional provision for equality has not been
implemented properly as a result of which Dalits and tribals are still
at the lower strata of society.
Demanding that the authorities should amend the land settlement acts
so that land can be transferred to the dalits and tribals, Naik
alleged that 99 percent people of these two sections do not have land.
Besides, a majority of dalit and tribal people are yet to get any
homestead or agricultural land even so many years after independence
because of there is no sincerity in implementation of the decisions
made for their welfare, he said.
He warned that if corrective action was not taken, things will go out
of hand soon.

------------------------------------

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Saturday, March 20, 2010

[ZESTCaste] Fwd: Journalism College Chief's request concerning the SC/ST scholarships at the ACJ

[ZESTCaste] Will torch myself if not given a home, says poor Dalit

[ZESTCaste] Rahul on road to crack UP Dalit base

[ZESTCaste] Identity politics alone won’t do

[ZESTCaste] Outfit seeks separate state for dalits

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