Skip to main content

Top Gandhian questions UN chief's forthcoming visit to Vibrant Gujarat "mela" for corporate honchos

Dr Sudarshan Iyengar
Senior Gandhian thinker Sudarshan Iyengar has taken strong exception to United Nations (UN) secretary-general Ban Ki- moon’s decision to deliver keynote address at the Vibrant Gujarat world business meet on January 11 at Gandhinagar, saying, the topmost UN dignitary’s participation in the “mela” of business honchos does not augur well with the overall UN ideology. In an article he has penned for Gujarati journal “Nireekshak”, Dr Iyengar said, among the main directions the UN is supposed to take include sustainable development, guarding against manmade and natural disasters, working against violent conflicts and for peace, and defending human rights.
Pointing out that Ki-moon himself declared this as his agenda on January 25, 2012, when he took over the office for the second term, Iyengar, who just retired as vice-chancellor of Mahatma Gandhi-founded university, Gujarat Vidyapeeth in Ahmedabad, said, as none of this is the agenda of the Vibrant Gujarat summit, it is “difficult to understand” why the UN secretary-general is trying to give credence to the “mela”. The “mela”, he said, is aimed at discussing different types of offers Gujarat has made to attract business investment.
“It is strange that international leaders, who should be discussing this with national leaders, are attending a state function of this type. It is particularly a matter of serious concern that the UN secretary-general has accepted the invitation”, Iyengar underlined in his hard-hitting comment, which he forwarded to www.counterview.net.
Not only does the UN secretary-general’s presence in the top Gujarat event “undermine the dignity” of the post Ki-moon holds, the senior Gandhian said, his presence at the Vibrant Gujarat 2015 is of "significance" for another reason, too. “The UN’s main agenda include ending to conditions of violent conflicts between nations, working for equality and justice, and providing a secure livelihood. If Ki-moon fails to offer this during his keynote speech, one would only conclude that the UN is acting under the direct pressure of world market forces and business honchos.”
Pointing towards “structural violence” that is prevailing in some parts of the world because of sharply-accelerated discrimination based on gender, caste, creed, religion and race, Iyengar suggested that the UN’s aim should be to work for ensuring to root out such conflicts.
“There is a further acceleration in these conflicts because of the sale of latest technology arms and ammunition in the free world market. This is undermining world peace”, he said, regretting, India has already emerged as the largest importer of armaments in the world, against the backdrop of the “perceived threat” it faces from its neighbours. The defence-related imports have gone up by a whopping 111 per cent in the last five years, and there is no end to it.
Giving the example of latest technology military choppers and other armaments are sought from the US in the wake of the recent Modi visit to Washington, with Russia now sharply chipping in, making the US wary, Iyengar said, back home, in India, “structural violence” can be seen taking new forms.
Already, he said, the “Hinduist organizations and individuals” are seeking forced conversion as a panacea for India’s ills at a time when Modi is talking of pushing the country towards faster economic growth. Seen against this backdrop, the Gandhian said, Ki-moon’s visit would only give an additional credence to the view that emergence of India as a theological states, a Hindu Rashtra, is “essential for fighting Islamic extremism and terrorism.” 

Comments

TRENDING

Patriot, Link: How Soviet imbroglio post-1968 crucially influenced alternative media platforms

Adatata Narayanan, Aruna Asaf Ali Alternative media, as we know it today in the age of information and communication technology (ICT), didn't exist in the form it does today during or around the time I joined formal journalism at Link Newsweekly as a sub-editor in January 1979. However, Link, and its sister publication Patriot, a daily—both published from Delhi—were known to have provided what could be called an alternative media platform at a time when major Delhi-based dailies were controlled by media barons.

Breaking news? Top Hindu builder ties up with Muslim investor for a huge minority housing society in Ahmedabad

There is a flutter in Ahmedabad's Vejalpur area, derogatorily referred to as the "border" because, on its eastern side, there is a sprawling minority area called Juhapura, where around five lakh Muslims live. The segregation is so stark that virtually no Muslim lives in Vejalpur, populated by around four lakh Hindus, and no Hindu lives in Juhapura.

60 crore in Mahakumbh? It's all hype with an eye on UP polls, asserts keen BJP supporter in Amit Shah's constituency

As the Mahakumbh drew to a close, during my daily walk, I met a veteran BJP supporter—a neighbor with whom we would often share dinner in a group. An amicable person, the first thing he asked me, as he was about to take the lift to his flat, was, "How many people do you think must have participated in the holy dip?" He then stopped by to talk—which we did for a full half-hour, cutting into my walk time.

Morari Bapu echoes misleading figures to support the BJP's anti-conversion agenda

A senior Gujarat activist phoned me today to inform me that the well-known storyteller on Lord Ram, Morari Bapu, has made an "unsubstantiated" and "preposterous" statement in Songadh town, located in the tribal-dominated Tapi district. He claimed that while the Gujarat government wants the Bhagavad Gita to be taught in schools, the "problem is" that 75% of government teachers "are Christians who do not let this happen" and are “involved in religious conversions.”

An untold story? Still elusive: Gujarati language studies on social history of Gujarat's caste and class evolution

This is a follow-up to my earlier blog , where I mentioned that veteran scholar Prof. Ghanshyam Shah has just completed a book for publication on a topic no academic seems to have dealt with—caste and class relations in Gujarat’s social history. He forwarded me a chapter of the book, published as an "Economic & Political Weekly" article last year, which deals with the 2015 Patidar agitation in the context of how this now-powerful caste originated in the Middle Ages and how it has evolved in the post-independence era.

New York-based digital company traces Modi's meteoric rise to global Hindutva ecosystem over several decades

A recent document, released by the Polis Project Inc.—a New York-based digital magazine and hybrid research and journalism organization—even as seeking to highlight the alleged rise of authoritarianism in India, has sought to trace Prime Minister Narendra Modi's meteoric rise since 2014 to the ever-expanding global Hindutva ecosystem over the last several decades.

Caste, class, and Patidar agitation: Veteran academic 'unearths' Gujarat’s social history

Recently, I was talking with a veteran Gujarat-based academic who is the author of several books, including "Social Movements in India: A Review of Literature", "Untouchability in Rural India", "Public Health and Urban Development: The Study of Surat Plague", and "Dalit Identity and Politics", apart from many erudite articles and papers in research and popular journals.

Justifying social divisions? 'Dogs too have caste system like we humans, it's natural'

I have never had any pets, nor am I very comfortable with them. Frankly, I don't know how to play with a pet dog. I just sit quietly whenever I visit someone and see their pet dog trying to lick my feet. While I am told not to worry, I still choose to be a little careful, avoiding touching the pet.

Martyrs’ Day at Sanand: Remembering Vinod Kinariwala amidst politics of remembrance

I was urged by a close relative, considered across my family as a binding force, to attend a grand ceremony on Martyrs' Day, March 23, along with four other relatives. The event, called Veeranjali (homage to martyrs), was to be held in an open space near Sanand town, about 15 kilometers from Ahmedabad. Martyrs' Day has been observed across India since independence, as it was on this day in 1931 that Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev, and Rajguru were executed.