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ACHA is an non-profit, non-political organization, which is dedicated to promote peace and harmony among South Asians regardless of where they live. Current Board Members are Pritam Rohila (President), Jagdish Grewal (Secretary), Dr. Abdul Qayum (Treasurer), Dr. Kanak R. Ravel, Gulzar Ahmed, Ishvar Patel and Susheela Hoefer. Dharam Yadav is the Honorary Financial Advisor. For more information about ACHA and comments about ACHA Bulletin, please contact us at by telephone at 503-362- 4635, or 503-658-4715, or by email at pritamr@open.org, or visit our Web Page at http://ecumene.org/ACHA/ACHA.htm . The Web Page is maintained by Dr. Ingrid H. Shafer, Professor of Philosophy, Religion & Interdisciplinary Studies, University of Science and Arts, Chickasha, OK. ( The Web Page used to be maintained by Dr. Sunil Khanna of OSU at http://osu.orst.edu/groups/acha/.)
This Bulletin is being relayed as a part of ACHA's South Asian community service program. Currently, it is being sent out every other Wednesday to about 300 individuals in Africa, Canada, India, New Zealand, Pakistan, U.K., and USA. Please let us know (pritamr@open.org), if you want to have your name removed from our email distribution list. Also, please let us know if someone should be added to the list. Comments, letters to editor, and short articles are also welcome and can be sent to the same address. THE SOUTH ASIAN WOMAN: ACHA BULLETIN SPECIAL 10/21/98
We believe that Peace in the World is not possible without peace in
the
CONTENTS
ABOUT ACHA * South Asian Cultural Survey Look for our table at the October 23, Kalakendra concert at Portland Art Museum. We are very grateful to Kalakendra Board. Also, we thank ICA, Gujarati Samaj. for mailing the survey questionnaire to their members, SAWERA for their support, and various individuals (Sarabjit Singh Anand, Vimal & Najma Benjamin Sharmila Bose, Alna.Chandnani, Anurag Gupta, Khalid & Sadia Hussain, Nasreen Ilias, Arun Joshi, Sunil Khanna, Theresa Miller, Sri Renganathan, Rita Soman, Parthasarthy Thota, Kuldip & Roshni Vaid, and Anand Vardhan and others) who have helped us in a variety of ways in this project. We need volunteers to help us by having their local South Asian friends and acquaintances complete the questionnaires. Please let us know, if you can help. Questionnaires are available also from India Direct, India Emporium, Srider's and Taj Mahal. Also, they can be obtained electrically by mailing a request to pritamr@open.org, or by copying from our Web Page at (Click Activities Current at the bottom of the home page). * South Asian Cultural Resource Center, in Portland-Vancouver Area A committee is being set up to help us flesh out details about implementation of this project. The first meeting of the committee will be held 2 to 4 p.m. on Saturday, November 14 in Portland. Please let us know if would like to serve on the committee or to participate in this meeting. For more information about the project, please click Future Plans at the bottom of our Web Page at <http://osu.orst.edu/groups/acha/>. SOUTH ASIAN WOMAN * Editorial by Pritam K. Rohila, Ph.D. "Ban on Bangladeshi women going abroad as maids and nurses" - Independent, Bangaldesh "Indian bride raped and murdered on seafront" - Colombo, Sri Lanka " Many districts in Punjab and Haryana had a low juvenile sex ratio" - A survey in India "Three sisters end lives to save dowry expenses" - Hardoi District, UP, India "Four Catholic nuns raped" - Nawapada (MP) "35-year-old tribal unwed mother died on the streets" - Tirunelli, Kerala" "Bosnian Serb denies raping Muslim women" - The Hague, Netherlands "Hundreds of Chinese women and children raped, mutilated and killed by mobs" - Jakarta, Indonesia "Women lawyers in complain of sexual harassment" - Madras, Tamil Nadu, India "Foreign-based Indian youths take rich Indian girls for a ride in alien places" "More than 5000 dowry deaths occur every year in India" - UNICEF "Third of women in Emergency Rooms were abused" - Journal of the American Medical Association "Women denied birth anesthesia, suit says" - Los Angeles, CA "Viagra vs. The Pill: Guess which one gets insurance coverage?" Planned Parenthood Association of the Willamette/Coulmbia, OR, USA Regardless of what the Sacred Books say, women have not been treated well woman in many parts of the world, but especially in South Asia. These recent newspapers headlines support this assertion. The abuse is not universal, but prevalent enough to be a cause of concern to us all. Female fetuses get aborted, Newborn girls get killed or are allowed to die. Female children are neglected by parents and their access to family resources, education, and health services are restricted. Brides are harassed by mother-in-laws. Sometimes, they get killed for lack of dowry or for being from a different caste or religion. They get physically and mentally abused or abandoned in foreign lands by their husbands. Sometimes, they get discarded for not being able to produce male children. Female employees are humiliated by their male coworkers, supervisors and employers. If widowed, remarriage as well as participation pleasurable pastimes is discouraged. When they grow older some of them get abandoned by their families and forced to seek protection in unscrupulous shelters. They are abused in jails by the policemen and are raped by terrorists, rioters, warriors and conquerors as a way of humiliating the enemy. Surely, men have something to do with this sorry state of affairs. But, women cannot escape the blame. Sometimes to cope with their own past abuse, and sometimes by willing cooperation or collusion women become tormenters of other women. Things will not change until men give up their delusions of superiority and claims to "divine rights" based upon the differences in their "plumbing" system. Also, women need to be persuaded to give up the victim role. The changes will require education and persuasion, as well as threat of punishment. Some signs of change are already there, thanks to the work numerous women's organizations. But, a lot more still needs to be accomplished. * Women & Things Cheaply Had A poem by Bangladeshi Writer and feminist Taslima Nasreen (Due to threats against her life, on account of charges of blasphemy, she had fled the country in 8/94 and lived in Sweden, Germany and USA. Recently, she returned to Bangladesh to look after her sick mother. Recently a court has ordered her arrest, and her accusers have refused to forgive her). In the market nothing can be had as cheap as women. If they get a small bottle of alta for their feet
Even the mangy cur of the house barks now and then,
* A Nation that Does Not Cherish the Honour of Its Women, is Doomed Dr Fakhruddin Ahmed (Excerpts from the Daily Star Internet Edition 7/29/1998) Once a man approached Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). "I want to commit adultery", he said. The Prophet asked him to sit down. "Do you want your mother to commit adultery?", the Prophet asked. "No", the man replied. "Do you want your wife to commit adultery?", was the Prophet's next question. "Of course not", was the man's reply. "Your sister?. The answer was still a firm "no!" Finally, the Prophet asked, "Do you want your daughter to commit adultery?". "Absolutely not!", the man was emphatic. Then the Prophet said: "Do you realize that every woman is someone's daughter, sister, wife or mother?" Nothing inflames the passion of civilized men more than the news that their women are under attack. To counter the African-American's civil rights movement in the 1950s and 60s, southern white supremacists circulated the following bizarre story to scare the southern men:"In their headquarters, the NAACP (the civil rights organization, "National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People") has keys to the bedroom of every white woman in America!" The fact that the Serb men were raping Muslim women in Bosnia is what galvanized Muslims throughout the world into action, in the recent past. Finally, have we forgotten how the news that the Pakistani soldiers had touched our women drove us insane in 1971? Islam is the first religion to give women their rights. Islam's holy Prophet emphasized that the mother is three times more important than the father. Yet, in Bangladesh, Muslim men rape Muslim women. (For those men who cannot control themselves, Islam prescribes two remedies: marriage or fasting.) Where are the religious leaders? Why, for instance did little Shazneen die in her own room, in her own house, in presence of her own parents, at the hand of the rapist? Where are our political leaders? Ultimately, it is the duty of the government to protect the life, property and honour of its citizens. If they cannot, they have no business being in power.... If Bangladeshi men violate Bangladeshi women only because the latter is physically weaker, then the rule of the jungle will prevail in the country... A nation that fails to defend the honour of its women is all animal; it is devoid of a soul and is not civilized. Bangladeshis worry about environmental pollution; that, however, is far easier to reverse than mental pollution.... Why don't the other good people, the real patriots of Bangladesh, rise up and make themselves heard? If the good people are not willing to take over the country, the evil will. * Women's Status Worst in North, Central India Excerpts from Rediff on the Net 8/7/98 The 24 most backward districts of the country in terms of the status of women and children are all in north and central India, shows a national survey released by the Central Social Welfare Board's the Center for Women's Studies, a Delhi-based non-governmental organization. The survey covered 15 major states and used 13 main women-sensitive indicators (such as sex ratio, literacy rates, child mortality, fertility and work participation) to assess the status of women and children in the rural areas. The survey found the Hindi heartland states of Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Haryana as the most women-unfriendly. Uttar Pradesh, with 13 of the 24 most backward districts, was on top of the list, followed by Madhya Pradesh (six), Rajasthan (three) and Punjab and Haryana (one each). Taking up the various indicators, the survey noted that a large number of districts in Punjab and Haryana had a low juvenile sex ratio. Rajasthan recorded the highest percentage of illiterate rural females with the literacy rate at nine. Other educationally poor states were Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh with only 14, 15 and 16 as literacy rates among females in the age group of six years and above. In addition to educational backwardness, the states of Rajasthan, UP, MP and Bihar are also noted for the higher incidence of child marriages and lower mean age at marriage. The infant mortality rates among females are the highest in Madhya Pradesh followed by Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Rajasthan, while child mortality is prominent in UP, MP, Rajasthan and Maharashtra. Among 50 district with high fertility rates, the majority are in Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan. Four districts of Punjab, Kinnaur in HP, Malda of West Bengal and Malappuram of Kerala also figure in this list. The female work participation rates are low in Punjab, Haryana and UP as well as in West Bengal. The south Indian states and Maharashtra record a high degree of WPR among females. While Salem in Tamil Nadu fared badly in respect of juvenile sex ratio, Dakshin Kannad in Karnataka was has earned adverse remarks due total marital fertility measures, Karimnagar and Nizamabad in Andhra Pradesh for high child marriages, Ranchi in Bihar for high infant mortality rate among females and Kishanganj in Bihar for a wide gap in work participation rates among rural males and females. (UNI ) * Legalized Cruelty Against Women in Pakistan Excerpts From SHE (Saher-e-zine) Magazine July 1998 The Hudood Ordinance has become the fate of the Pakistani women, which not only negates the very concept of justice, but violates and contradicts the fundamental rights of the citizens of Pakistan. The cruel mutated version of the Hudood Ordinance, is the Zina Ordinance which replaced the main principle of jurisprudence, in which the accused is presumed innocent, until proven guilty. But with the implementation of the said ordinance, the accused is guilty until she proves herself innocent. There have been countless examples where a woman is charged under Zina without any proof as there is no law for protecting such women who are brought under false charges. Several cases were dismissed on the ground, stating them to be false and implicated the women due to some enmity or they were not proved innocent due to lack of evidence, but there is not a single case in which a person was brought to trial for bringing a false case. The actual law of the Quran is about false accusation, which is being violated everyday in this very Islamic State. Under these circumstances it has become extremely vital to bring such cases to light, otherwise women will continue to suffer and men will continue to triumph over them, escaping without being punished and leaving behind constant reminders that what once happened, can easily happen again. * My daughter Mansie By V. Gangadhar (Excerpts from an article in Rediff on the Net 8/8/98) It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. No, I am not going back to the times of Charles Dickens and his famous first sentence in A Tale of Two Cities. I experienced the best and the worst of time early Monday morning at Bombay's Sahar International airport. Our 24-year-old daughter, Mansie, who had come home on a month's holiday was returning to her studies in the US. It was wonderful to have her again with us, and dreadful to miss her. The one-month vacation just flew away and as her day of departure arrived all the old tensions over her welfare, safety and future came back once again. This was the worst part of the experience. What was the best part? Mansie was happy to go back and was confident she would do well in her studies. She had changed universities and was off to the Florida State University for her PhD programme. She told us that in her first two years in the US, she had made mistakes and learnt from them. She had chalked out her future and in a way, I was relieved that the responsibility had slipped out of my hands. Responsibility and confidence. I guess these are the key words to build one's future, particularly in a foreign nation. What was I doing when I was 24? I was clinging on to a job which I did not like and the future appeared dark. Working as a clerk in an Ahmedabad textile mill at a monthly salary of Rs 150 crippled my dreams. Would I end up as a clerk even at the time of retirement? It was a frightening prospect. There were no Gulf jobs in those days and no one I knew possessed a passport. Only the mill owners and their family members went abroad. We talked shop all the time. Promotions, additional bonus, scrounging for overtime. I also knew that quite a few of my friends were envious of my job because I worked in a well-established, profit-making textile mill. But I sadly lacked the vision to look ahead, take risks and plan for a better future. The only extra qualification I thought about was learning to drive a truck. Someone told me that truck drivers earned much more than a textile mill clerk! Well finally I got out of the rut and settled down to do something which I had always wanted to do. Write. It took me nearly 30 years to reach this goal, and time did not stop for anyone. Quite often, I thought whether I had blundered in not making certain moves to improve my prospects when my career was not taking off. Perhaps that is why I admire the guts and initiative of the younger generation. My daughter, from the time she was in Standard V, decided she was going to study Physics, particularly Astro Physics. We accepted her statement. "Oh, children are like that," I told my wife. "They have their own whims. Didn't I want to be a film hero when I was her age?" But Mansie pursued her goal relentlessly through school, college and university while she completed her MSc. All the while, he was also pursuing opportunities to study Physics abroad. This became her magnificent obsession. In 1996, she finally won a scholarship and went abroad. Life was totally different, the approach to studies was something new for her. Adjustment came, but rather slowly. Money was another major problem. At home, she lacked nothing, but now she had to balance her budget carefully. Food, accommodation, medical bills, insurance, taxes... She had to buy a car because without one she was almost immobile. Well, the adjustments were made, the lessons learnt. Then came the opportunity to move to a different university where she could work on her favourite branch of Physics and also make more money. She kept us informed about all these developments. Since we did not know anything about the academic system in the US, we could only advise her to think twice and make her won decisions. The two years had effected many changes in Mansie. She had learnt to study issues thoroughly. Judge people better and be less gullible. She learnt to keep and run a home. And wonder of wonders, learnt cooking. This daughter of mine, had always shunned the kitchen when she was with us. She used to exclaim loftily that she was meant for better things! Well, after a couple of months in the US, she began asking for recipes. My wife was amused when her daughter's e-mail messages gave us the news that she had organised dinners for her friends where they were served with delicacies like rasam, sambhar, tandoori chicken and masala. "I wonder how all these tasted like," she observed. "Why not hope for the best," I reassured her. Yet, in a way, she had not changed all that much. She was still impatient, talked very fast, and gobbled up food. "Do you eat like this in your home?" I asked. "No, because no one there serves food like this," she replied with her mouth full. Mansie continued to quarrel vigorously with her younger sister, who in her absence, pinched and wore some of her favourite blouses and tops. The house was often noisy and in a mess. But then who bothered? When shall we see her again? I have no idea though she promised another visit in 2001 when her passport expired. The year 2001 is so far away! What kind of life will I be leading three years from now. My wife has a simple philosophy. 'Jo hotha hain achhe ke leiye hotha hain' (Whatever happens, happens for the good). I guess I better start believing that. * Services for South Asian Women (It is not a complete list. Please help us compile a more comprehensive list) . Canada
England
India
Pakistan
USA
HOLIDAYS: October - 22 Bahi Duj, 31 Halloween; November - 3 Hazrat Ali's Birthday, 4 Guru Nanak's Birthday, 11 Veteran's Day (USA), 24 Guru Teg Bhadur's Martyrdom Day, 26 Thanksgiving Day (USA). ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT * October 23, Portland, OR, USA: AN EVENING OF NORTH INDIAN CLASSICAL MUSIC featuring Shubhendra Rao on Sitar and Partho Sarthy on Sarod, at 8:00 p.m., in the Grand Ballroom in the north wing of Portland Art Museum. Free to members, and $12/$15s for Non-members. More info from www.kalakendra.org. * October 24, Buena Park, CA, USA: SHAB-E-GHAZAL by Munni Begum and troupe at Sequoia Athletic Club Grand Ball Room, 7530 Orangethorpe Ave at 8 p.m. More info from 562-402-7443. * October 25, Palo Alto, CA, USA: RANGEELA RAJASTHAN & SERAIKELLA CHHAU DANCE by Pandit Gopal Dubey and Chhaya Academy of Arts of Bombay at Cubberley Theater, 4000 Middlefield Rd at 5 p.m. Tickets at $25, & $20. More info from 925-947-1908. * October 25, San Francisco, CA, USA: DARBAR, a Kathak dance-drama by Chitresh Das and his troupe at McKenna Theater, S.F State University, 1600 Holloway Ave, at 4:30 p.m. More info from 415-759-8060 * November 6, Portland, OR, USA: BHARATHAM: BHAVA RAGA TALAM, an evening of classical Indian dance with Jayanthi Raman and her group of 6 dancers, at 7:30 p.m. at Northwest Service Center, 1819 NW Everett. Tickets at $11/13 and $8/10 from Fred Meyer Fstixx 503-224- 8499. Mor info from natya_dance@hotmail.com. OTHER EVENTS * October 28, Salem, OR, USA: OUR COMMUNITY'S RESPONSE TO DOMESTIC VIOLENCE, a free public forum, 7-9 p.m., at Loucks Auditorium, Salem Public Library. More info from Women's Crisis Service at 378-1572. * October 30, Salem, OR, USA: HELPING BATTERED IMMIGRANT WOMEN, a workshop
at Best Western New Kings Inn Motel, 8.30 am - 5.30 pm. More info from
SAWERA 503-778-7386, or sawera@teleport.com .
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