This Land Is Mine I Am Not Of This Land Caa Nrc And The Manufacture Of Statelessness

Description The Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), passed by the Parliament of India in December 2019, promises citizenship to migrants of the 'Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi or Christian community from Afghanistan, Bangladesh or Pakistan'. By excluding Muslims from the list and not extending the promise to refugees from any of India's non-Muslim-majority neighbours, the CAA makes religion the basis of citizenship for the first time in the history of the Republic. Many fear that this Act, coupled with a countrywide National Register of Citizens (NRC), will eventually be used to disenfranchise India's Muslims, or to trap them in a permanent state of fear and insecurity, which has been the fate of millions of Bengali-origin Muslims of Assam. This Land is Mine, I Am Not of This Land brings together a comprehensive selection of essays that deal with the theoretical, political and subjective aspects of this issue. The first section traces the evolution of citizenship in India. The following section deals with the peculiar case of Assam. Covered here are the bureaucratic travesties unleashed in the name of protecting the state from 'external aggression' as well as their sobering human cost. The concluding sections expose the superfluousness of the National Population Register (NPR), and pose serious questions on the constitutionality of the CAA. The book argues that with a key value like citizenship in question, it is not just the destinies of India's citizens but the very democratic foundation of the Republic that is at stake.

The 1947 Partition of British India remains the largest instance of forced migration in the recorded human history. Despite the passage of time, it is still widely seen as a process of singular distress and sorrow. Yet, for those in the subcontinent, the Partition also offers a process of self-exploration for subsequent generations. This book is the first collection of chapters related to the Partition studies wherein experts of various disciplines from the three major modern nation-states affected by this cataclysm - Bangladesh, India, and Pakistan - have closely collaborated to develop a nuanced assessment of the Partition as active in the present. The book casts a somber yet uplifting light on the enormous challenges the Partition imposed on societies struggling to emerge from generations of colonial rule into a post-war world depleted of resources and a future of uncertain prospects.

amid widespread protests, the Indian Parliament passed the citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 on 11 December 2019. A topic of heated debate, the caa has divided the country into two distinct groups-one section of people considers the apprehensions about the caa being a case of miss-readings of the Act, and the other thinks the 'non-secular' Act is a manifestation of the prejudices and malevolent agenda of the ruling party. But does either side really understand the caa? Or, for that matter, does anyone who has listened to the shrill and often unconvincing arguments for and against the Act? In this short but powerful book, Amit Malviya and Salman Khurshid present to us the two sides of the debate that took the country by storm. While offering insights into the history and politics of the citizenship debate, they leave it up to us to decide which side we are on.

During the Second World War, many of the Indians settled in Burma were killed following the bombing of Rangoon by the Japanese Air Force. Thousands more were forced to give up everything-their homes, their businesses and shops, even their families-and flee to India to escape the invasion. The lucky ones flew home. Others followed by ship, crossing the Bay of Bengal under constant threat of aerial and submarine bombardment. But most walked all the way, to Manipur and then Assam, braving hunger, disease, wild animals and exhaustion. Some walked the more hazardous route further north, across the Hukaung Valley, which came to be called the Valley of Death. Drawing primarily on recollections from the survivors and descendants of Burma's once-thriving Goan community, this compelling book is the first attempt to write an oral history of the 'Forgotten Long March'- one of the biggest and most harrowing migrations in recent history.

"Explores the horse in Indian mythology and history. Despite the fact that horses were imported to India and associated with foreigners and conquerors, Indian villagers created wonderful stories and brilliant visual images of horses. The author relates how Turkish horses, tribal horses, Dalit horses, Hindu stallions, and Arab mares all mix in streams of story that raise issues about the assimilation of foreign cultures in India"--

'Elegant, lucid and funny, this book will appeal to as many readers as there are desires.'--Shohini Ghosh 'The history of desire in India, ' writes Madhavi Menon in this splendid book, 'reveals not purity but impurity as a way of life. Not one answer, but many. Not a single history, but multiple tales cutting across laws and boundaries.' In Bhakti poetry, Radha and Krishna disregard marital fidelity, age, time and gender for erotic love. In Sufi dargahs, pirs (spiritual guides) who were married to women are buried alongside their male disciples, as lovers are. Vatsyayana, author of the world's most famous manual of sex, insists that he did not compose it 'for the sake of passion', and remained celibate through the writing of it. Long hair is widely seen as a symbol of sexuality; and yet, shaved off in a temple, it is a sacred offering. Even as the country has a draconian law to punish homosexuality, heterosexual men share the same bed without comment. Hijras are increasingly marginalized; yet gender has historically been understood as fluid rather than fixed. Menon navigates centuries, geographies, personal and public histories, schools of philosophy, literary and cinematic works, as she examines the many--and often surprising--faces of desire in the Indian subcontinent. Her study ranges from the erotic sculptures of Khajuraho to the shrine of the celibate god Ayyappan; from army barracks to public parks; from Empress Nur Jahan's paan to home-made kohl; from cross-dressing mystics to androgynous gods. It shows us the connections between grammar and sex, between hair and war, between abstinence and pleasure, between love and death. Gloriously subversive, full of extraordinary analyses and insights, this is a book you will read to be enlightened and entertained for years.

'Saadat Hasan Manto has a good claim to be considered the greatest South Asian writer of the 20th century... [He] incarnated the exuberance, the madness, the alcoholic delirium of his time...'--Suketu Mehta, The New York Times This remarkable anthology brings together stories about Saadat Hasan Manto, essayist, scriptwriter, and a master of the short story, by his friends, family and rivals--among others, Ismat Chughtai, Upendranath Ashk, Balwant Gargi, Krishan Chander, his daughter Nuzhat and nephew Hamid Jalal. These are accounts of grand friendships and quarrels, protracted drinking bouts, cutthroat rivalries in the world of Urdu letters, and intense engagement with issues of that turbulent age. Together, they form an unprecedented portrait of the literary and film worlds of the time, and of the great cities of Bombay, Delhi and Lahore. They also offer a glimpse of the making of a legend even as they reveal Manto as a complex man of many contradictions. A devoted husband and father, he was as comfortable at home as he was at prostitutes' quarters, seeking new material. Generous to a fault, he freely gave away his earnings and often put his family in financial jeopardy. Fiercely competitive and an outspoken critic of others' writing, he brooked no criticism of his own, at times choosing to sever ties rather than have his words tampered with. And, for much of his adult life, right until the end, Manto was an alcoholic who fiercely defended his choice to remain one. Honest, frank and personal, at times sentimental, and critical--even gossipy--at others, the pieces in Manto-Saheb constitute an unparalleled, multi-faceted biography of a genius