The controversy continues - with a silver lining?

The IPL controversy all but died down in Pakistan after India's otherwise hawkish Union Home minister condemned the decision. The stand taken by Chidambaram, a Hindu, who comes down hard on Pakistan for fomenting terrorism, did much to reassure Pakistan that the Indian government was not, as widely perceived, behind the decision.

But in India, the controversy continues, with the "Indian Taliban" as the Hindu right wing have been dubbed, turning viciously on the darling of Bollywood, Shah Rukh Khan (SRK), for his stance on the issue.

Like many Indian Muslims, the Mumbai-based SRK is staunchly nationalistic - often too loudly so, as Badri Raina writes ('Constructing Shah Rukh Khan: When Reason Takes a Holiday', Zmag.org, Feb 3). "He unselfconsciously avails of everything that a shining India has on offer-game shows, talk shows, sundry public events, and the IPL T20 cricket tamasha. His groupies span delirious young Indian women from every community and caste. Solid contribution to national unity there."

Shah Rukh Khan was among those Indians who slammed the IPL's blanket boycott of the Pakistani players, stating that the Pakistani players, being the best in the business, should have been bought. That, comments Raina, "is when all hell broke loose in Mumbai".

The Shiv Sena supremo, Bal Thackeray wrote in the party organ, Dopahar Ka Saamna, "Shah Rukh is, after all, no ordinary Indian; he is a Muslim" and therefore has a pro-Pakistani bias. This was the signal for "the lumpen armies to go to work". Shah Rukh's posters and effigies were "duly consigned to the flames of patriotism, and his house besieged and vandalized. Instructions have gone out that his forthcoming movie must be boycotted. And he has been advised to make Karachi his home.

All that when one would have thought that the prime target of the ' patriots ' ought to have been the home minister whose job, after all, is to secure the nation from Pakistani perfidy rather than express sentiments favourable to their cricketers!

"But then he is a distinguished Hindu. Whereas, 'by favouring the inclusion of Pakistani cricketers, Shah Rukh has proved that he is a Muslim first and foremost."

Another of India's finest actors, Aamir Khan, also a Muslim (recipient of a national award on India's Republic Day recently), took the same view as Shah Rukh and the home minister. The Sena promptly lumped him with SRK.

Indian civil rights activists are outraged at the Sena's tactics (see box items). But there's more to the Sena's actions than first meets the eye. Raina notes that the Shiv Sena in Mumbai had been caught on the back foot with their recent drive against 'immigrants' from north India, especially Uttar Pradesh and Bihar (pejoratively called Bhaiyas in Mumbai). Their campaign focused on the jobs and other opportunities the 'bhaiyas' were grabbing that "rightfully" belong to the "indigenous" Marathis.

Another right-wing Hindu group, the Rashtriya Swayam Sevak Sangh (RSS) had taken the position that Mumbai belongs to all Indians, not just to Marathis -- a position endorsed by such icons as Sachin Tendulkar and Mukesh Ambani. The Sena, writes Raina, pounced on the IPL issue to castigate Shah Rukh and Aamir Khan, "to quickly remind everybody that its regional/ethnic passions have in no measure lessened its communal ones, as it declares war on both fronts."

This put the RSS in a quandary. Normally, it would have joined loudly in this campaign. But Shah Rukh and Aamir are also Hindi-speaking north Indians - and the RSS has taken the stand that north Indians must be protected from the Sena.

The story, writes Raina, underlines the need to acknowledge the multiple identities that exist in India. "Happily, India has much changed since the demolition of the Babri mosque in 1992, and it can be said that in a contest between non-sectarian Indians and sectarian ones, the latter are beginning to lose supremacy. An excellent time then to jettison complacence and to drive home the all-important task of exorcising the ghosts that haunt ' resurgent ' India.

"And in that enterprise, there is no greater ally than India's impoverished millions (some seven out of ten) who couldn't care less about who belongs to what region or bears what name." - AKA


The situation is not irretrievable

We feel that the situation is not irretrievable. Pakistani cricketers can still be included as there are possibilities of replacement due to injury. We appeal to all IPL team management to accommodate Pakistani cricketers, and to the government to take initiative in assuring the team owners that political groups will not be allowed to disturb the matches. At the same time, we also appeal to the Pakistan Cricket Board to revoke the cancellation of NOC given to Pakistani cricketers to enable them to participate in the IPL 3.

Extract from statement by prominent Indian citizens:

Admiral L Ramdas - Mumbai
Mahesh Bhatt - Mumbai
Jatin Desai - Mumbai
Mazher Hussain - Hyderabad
Kamla Bhasin - Delhi
Seema Mustafa - Delhi
Sukla Sen - Mumbai
Meena Menon - Mumbai
Manisha Gupte - PuneHyderabad
Kamla Bhasin - Delhi
Seema Mustafa - Delhi
Sukla Sen - Mumbai
Meena Menon - Mumbai
Manisha Gupte - Pune

Slamming the 'tamasha' SRK and defending

Peace Mumbai, a coalition of organisations and activists working towards a just peace in the sub-continent in particular has slammed "the highly deplorable farce of keeping Pakistani players out at the recent auction of the IPL. Things looked so ugly that even the Union Home Minister, no peacenik by any stretch, has gone on record strongly disapproving the orchestrated tamasha."

The Peace Mumbai statement, signed by activists Sukla Sen, Varsha R Berry, Nasreen Contractor and Asad Bin Saif, terms as "revolting" the Shiv Sena's "vile and vicious tirade" against Shah Rukh Khan for voicing his disapproval of the IPL fiasco and stating that he would have hired a Pakistani cricketer had a slot been available.

They note that "the Union Home Minister has been spared, even though he expressed exactly the same sort of sentiments, SRK has been chosen as a target clearly on account his perceived vulnerability on more than one counts."

The group places on record "its profound appreciation of SRK for his gritty refusal to buckle down. It also demands that the state government must provide all the legitimate protection to him in this specific context."