News you don't hear from India (and why you don't hear it)

[Cain]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/jun/05/arundhati-roy-keep-destabilised-danger

want to talk more about Mary Roy – and eventually we do – but there's one important point to clear up first. Guerrillas use violence, generally directed against the police and army, but sometimes causing injury and death to civilians caught in the crossfire. Does she condemn that violence? "I don't condemn it any more," she says. "If you're an adivasi [tribal Indian] living in a forest village and 800 CRP [Central Reserve Police] come and surround your village and start burning it, what are you supposed to do? Are you supposed to go on hunger strike? Can the hungry go on a hunger strike? Non-violence is a piece of theatre. You need an audience. What can you do when you have no audience? People have the right to resist annihilation."

[...]

Roy talks about the resistance as an "insurrection"; she makes India sound as if it's ripe for a Chinese or Russian-style revolution. So how come we in the west don't hear about these mini-wars? "I have been told quite openly by several correspondents of international newspapers," she says, "that they have instructions – 'No negative news from India' – because it's an investment destination. So you don't hear about it. But there is an insurrection, and it's not just a Maoist insurrection. Everywhere in the country, people are fighting."

The reporter dismisses this suggestion but, as you read the interview, you'll notice quickly that the reporter is a sanctimonious sack of shit who thinks you should just stand aside and let armed men burn your home down.  Maybe lodge an official complaint later, as well.  Smug westerners are such hypocrites when it comes to political violence.

Strangely enough, I'm quite familiar with the Adivasi and their struggle, first from reading about the Naxalite uprisings in India, and secondly because a case study of an Adivasi village actually forms the basis of the UK Geography Cirriculum.  In fact, I did my lesson plan for my interview on this exact topic.

[Phox]

 Well, I am glad that I got to learn about this, because I didn't have a clue. What a scumbag.

[Telarus]

Damn! 

[Cain]

Well, I am glad that I got to learn about this, because I didn't have a clue. What a scumbag.

From friends I have who travelled in India (and said the Maoist held territory was always the cleanest, friendliest and least corrupt) and from an academic I know who did his post-doctoral field work on the Naxalite rebellion, I know for a fact that several provinces in India are hotly disputed as to who they actually belong to.

The fact the interviewer doesn't seem aware of this puts his knowledge of India, and thus how the media treats India, into question.

On top of being a scumbag, yes.

India doesn't like this kind of information getting out, because, internally, they like to view themselves as the "world's largest democracy".  A democracy that is rife with inequality, religious extremism, secessionist movements, caste-based bigotry, racism and high corruption.  In fact, based on that description, India is truly a world power, and deserving a place next to the likes of China, Russia and the USA.