Accusing BRICS TNCs of being equally brutal, People's Forum to hold global meet ahead of BRICS Goa summit

By Our Representative
In a major effort to influence international opinion ahead of the eighth BRICS summit, to be held in Goa on October 15-16, well-known Indian and foreign civil rights organizations have come together for an international convention in the state on October 13-14, accusing BRICS of working for merely promoting its own transnational corporations (TNCs), exploiting the poor.
Acronym for Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, BRICS summit is taking place following the Hangzhou G20 and the Venezuela Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) summits, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi giving the latter a miss.
While the issues likely to be discussed at the summit include sluggish global economic growth, the breakdown of the Doha trade round at the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the emergence of bilateral and regional Free Trade Agreements (FTAs), as for India regional cooperation in South Asia is likely to weigh heavily.
The People's Forum of BRICS, formed to hold the global convention ahead of the BRICS summit, will meet at the Xavier Centre of Historical Research, Alto Porvorim, Goa, with as many as 35 Indian and 12 civil rights bodies endorsing it.
Those from India include National Alliance of People's Movements, All-India People’s Science Network, All India Secular Forum, Centre for Finance Accountability, Citizens for Peace and Justice, Delhi Science Forum, Delhi Solidarity Group, Indian Social Action Forum, National Fishworkers Forum, South Asia Dialogues for Ecological Democracy, and Toxics Watch Alliance.
International endorsements consist of Beyond Copenhagen Collective, Angikar Bangladesh Foundation, Asia Pacific Movement on Debt and Development, Campaign for Climate Justice (Nepal), International Network of Catholic Social Justice Organisations, Globalisation Monitor (China), NGO Forum on ADB, and Brazilian Network for People´s Integration.
In a statement, the People's Forum of BRICS has said, it will attempt to “raise critical voices from below on social, ecological, political and economic concerns that are often ignored at big summits such as BRICS.”
Taking objection to developments following the BRICS New Development Bank (NDB), such as the China-led Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and the Contingent Reserve Arrangement (CRA),the statement says, the agenda of all of it is no different from “the hegemony of western dominated institutions such as the World Bank, Asian Development Bank (ADB) and International Monetary Fund (IMF).”
“For example”, the statement says, “During a balance of payment crisis, the CRA forces a borrowing country to go to the IMF for a neoliberal structural adjustment programme after getting just 30% of its quota in CRA loans.”
The statement underlines, “BRICS’ transnational corporations (TNCs) that extract valuable resources from the world’s poorest regions are reported to be just as brutal in accumulating capital as northern TNCs. The BRICS’ record at the WTO, FTAs and at the UN climate negotiations has also been one of strategic accommodation with the global North.”
Pointing out that BRICS' focus is on “adherence to a largely neo-liberal development model and an export-led growth trajectory based on cheap labour, rising inequality, financial speculation and multinational corporate exploitation”, the statement says, it has “little consideration for social and ecological costs” involved in all this.
Accusing BRICS countries of trampling civil rights, the statement says, in India, any protests in India are dubbed “anti-national”, in Brazil, the country's democratically elected President Dilma Rousseff was ousted through a constitutional coup, in South Africa the neo-liberal policies have an unemployment rate of 40%, Russia is pushing an authoritarian capitalist model, China's capitalism is resulting in dispossession and pauperisation of the disempowered.

Comments

India failing to dictate diplomatic preferences of Nepal, Bhutan, is unfairly blaming Beijing: Chinese daily

By Our Representative
In a sharply-worded editorial, a top Chinese media outfit, described by BBC as state-run, has said, commenting on India's foreign relations with its neighbours, that "speculation and suspicion" is "certainly not diplomacy". Published in "China Daily", the largest circulating English Monday-to-Saturday newspaper with branches across the world, the editorial notes (September 20) that "several recent events" in Nepal and Bhutan, are "gnawing worrywarts in New Delhi".
The editorial -- which comes close on the heels of a sharp critique of India's foreign policy in a state-supported Russian media outfit, Sputnik International, calling India's anti-Pak diplomacy as having "gone awry" following Prime Minister Narendra Modi's "half-baked" push for anti-terror drill down "others' throat" -- says, the " worrywarts" include "Nepalese troops taking part in a joint…

Accused of being RSS plant, Modi man, Hyderabad Urdu varsity chancellor asks President to probe "irregularities"

Counterview Desk
Refused entry in the Maulana Azad National Urdu University (MANUU), the central university's newly appointed chancellor Firoz Bakht Ahmed, who claims to be grand nephew of Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, has, in a letter to the President of India, said that MANUU vice-chancellor (V-C) Dr Aslam Parvaiz has accused him of being an RSS plant and a Modi man, whose sole aim is to "interfere in the working of the university".

Ahmedabad, GIFT, Adani city get 1.68 lakh acre ft Narmada water; Gujarat's rural areas just 4.27 AF: Letter to CM

Counterview Desk
Well-known farmer rights leader Sagar Rabari, in an open letter to Gujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani, has demanded a transparent account of Narmada water, saying, while he has received a "routine reply" from him to his earlier, the data emerging from his RTI application show huge quantity of water being directed to Ahmedabad, the 10 km stretch of Sabarmati for the Ahmedabad riverfront, and nearby elite urban areas, including the Adanis' Shantigram township and GIFT City.

17 lakh Jharkhand elderly, widows, differently abled do not receive pension: Public hearing told, aadhaar is a hurdle

By Our Representative
Hundreds of elderly, widows, single women and differently-abled persons from different districts of Jharkhand gathered near the Raj Bhavan in Ranchi for a public hearing organized by the Jharkhand Right to Food Campaign and Pension Parishad demanding the right to universal social security pensions ahead of World Elderly Day on October 1.

Ethnocide in Caribbean island filmed following award winning docufilm on Jamaica's anti-colonial Indian roots

International awards winner for Best Feature Documentary Linda Aïnouche for “Dreadlocks Story” (2014), which shows how Indians are entangled in the Jamaican society, and how Hinduism was a source of inspiration for the Rastafari movement, is all set to release her new documentary, “Marooned in the Caribbean”, which aims at documenting the awful desolating living conditions that Raizal people, the native inhabitants of San Andres Archipelago, endure.
Sons of slaves, these islanders have fallen prey to what the Colombian government calls Colombianization. “It’s a process”, according to her, “which kills the Raizal culture; it’s the killing of the Raizal soul. Colombianization subjugates Afro-descendants of San Andres to an ethnocide.”
Explorer, director and producer, Linda Aïnouche writes exclusively for Counterview: ***
Nobody escapes from blood and thunder in Colombia, and definitely not in the archipelago of San Andres, situated closer to Managua and Kingston than Bogota. The Raizal p…

India to deport Rohingya refugees, as the world moves towards prosecuting Myanmar for genocide

By Tapan Bose*
Seven Rohingya Muslims refugees who were held at a detention centre in Assam since 2012 will be handed over to Myanmar. The Supreme Court of India has refused to stop their deportation. The new Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gagoi said, "We are not inclined to interfere on the decision taken".

An elite Kutir set up by Modi far from the "madding" crowd: This Gandhi museum is formal, unapproachable

By Rajiv Shah
Have you ever heard of a Gandhi museum, sough to be projected as the “largest” on the Mahatma, yet totally inaccessible, in sharp contrast to Ahmedabad’s humble, approachable and unassuming Gandhi Ashram on the banks of Sabarmati, set up by the Mahatma during the heydays of the freedom movement? It exists about 30 kilometres away, its idea was conceived by none other than a person who has today become even more inaccessible than he ever was: Narendra Modi, India's Prime Minister.

History less known: Kasturba's role as an independent woman and a freedom fighter in her own right

By Nandini Oza*
Even the most deserving of women do not find a place that equals their worth in history. Kasturba is one such woman whose contribution to India’s struggle for freedom has been exemplary, and yet, it has not received the recognition it deserves. Kastur Makhanji Kapadia was born in the year 1869, the same year and in the same town of Porbandar in Gujarat as Gandhiji. In fact she was older than Gandhiji by a few months.

Hyderabad-based Urdu university "bars" entry of its new chancellor, who had "initiated" reforms in institute

Counterview Desk
In an unusual controversy, Aslam Parvaiz, vice-chancellor of of the Hyderabad-based Maulana Azad National Urdu University (MANUU) has restricted the entry of its newly appointed Chancellor, Firoz Bakht Ahmed, allegedly because he was trying to initiate reforms, including setting up of a Maulana Azad Center for Composite Culture and Progressive Studies, Model Madrasa, Center for Empowerment of Muslim Women, Course for the Development of Legal Vocabulary and Legal Consciousness in Urdu, and so on.

Poor response to tenders for Gujarat's bid for the world's tallest statue, no international firm shows interest

By Our Representative
The Gujarat government’s claim that its decision to build the world’s highest statue in the world, in the memory of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, would attract “tremendous” response top international construction companies, has gone phut. The state government floated international tenders in August to build the statue, which is slated to be 182-metres high. Despite the “international” character of the tenders and big claims, well-informed Sachivalaya sources close to Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi say, “not one international firm has come up to offer to carry out the construction activity.”

Counterview

Search This Blog