No understanding of India

THE EDITOR: A Passage to India, published in 1924, is a novel by EM Forster about racism, colonialism, white supremacy, and stereotyping of the natives by its white occupiers, viz Britain.

The plot is about an unfounded rape charge by a white woman against an Indian male. While a white male supports the Indian male and the white woman rescinds her charge, leading to the Indian male’s freedom, many relationships are broken in the process and turn out to be beyond repair.

One white woman, Ms Moore, in A Passage to India realises that there is no “real” India, ie, no one category by which to stereotype an Indian identity, but that there are complex realities that is India.

In your March 5 editorial, the Newsday writes its “A Passage to India” that parallels the racism, supremacist views and stereotyping expressed by Forster.

The editorial seeks to analyse the current issue of TT’s direct access to covid19 vaccines from India, while other Caricom states seem to have done so with much gratitude.

Instead of examining the facts around the issues, the editorial drops a foul-smelling “red herring” to attack India and its prime minister. The editorial asks, “...is (it) appropriate for anyone to accept India’s philanthropy in the first place, given the dismal record of Mr Modi? Why is this country, and Caricom as a whole, content to allow itself to be a pawn in India’s soft diplomacy game?” Many were stunned out of their underwear by this red herring.

The newspaper accuses Mr Modi of eroding democratic norms, undoubtedly parroting the false narratives of the virulent left that is openly anti-Modi. Obviously, the Newsday lacks the intellectual wherewithal by which to analyse such a serious discourse as independent India’s Marxist roots and its only attempt to uproot the latter through India’s Modi.

India’s democracy is alive and kicking in its very complex realities. And the Newsday is not even smart enough like the white woman, Ms Moore, in Forster’s novel, to realise that India is a very complex place with diversities such as are not present in any other part of the world.

India is the world’s oldest living civilisation. Where does Mr Modi’s defence of Kashmir as Indian territory come into this? Kashmir (Hindu or Muslim majority) has always belonged to India. The nonsense of partition by race and religion and ethnicity is causing unending genocide, pain and suffering around the world.

The next thing I am likely to hear from Newsday is that TT should be separated based on Indian and African and other identities. Words elude me. The Newsday also does not understand the definition of “Hindu” or “Hindutva” as per the Indian Constitution or India’s ancient civilisation. It defines the terms as the Abrahamic religions do of their religions, starting off therefore on the wrong track.

As to harassment of “rights defenders, activists, journalists, students, academics and critical voices,” this continues the global left disinformation and misinformation. The farmers issues and Rihanna? You can’t get more laughable than that. The editorial totally displays its ignorance of the separatist monies and politics driving that.

So the Newsday gives these arguments to advise TT that we should not capitulate to India’s kisses in giving us covid19 vaccines.

“The lack of an adequate supply of covid19 jabs poses a clear and present danger to the region. But some would argue it is equally risky to make a deal with the devil.” The Newsday concludes that accepting vaccines from India is like dealing with the devil.

The hate and racism against Indians cannot be made clearer if you read the many nuances in that horrible Newsday editorial. Like the white woman, Mrs Moore, in Forster’s A Passage to India, the Newsday has failed to recognise the great diversity that is India, its colonial past, its continuity as an ancient civilisation, its Marxist roots in independent India...in other words, the many realities that is India.

The Newsday’s editorial is the white racism and supremacy against India, still seen as a colonial subject.

PANDITA DR INDRANI RAMPERSAD

via e-mail
Editor’s note:A 2019 BBC report described Kashmir as “a Himalayan region that both India and Pakistan say is fully theirs...India and Pakistan subsequently went to war over it and each came to control different parts of the territory with a ceasefire line agreed.”

In August 2019 Mr Modi’s government stripped Kashmir of its autonomy. The BBC also describes Mr Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) as a “Hindu nationalist party...whose electoral success is largely attributed to Mr Modi’s charisma and the politics of religious polarisation and strident nationalism.”