I spoke to both revolutionary sides in
#Myanmar
’s
#ChinState
(& the NUG) to understand the conflicting visions & strategies at play, & whether a united Chin front can emerge again.
My report for
@FrontierMM
:
Nearly 2 years ago, The Gambia, a small west African country, dragged Myanmar to the ICJ for its genocidal campaign against the Rohingya (& successfully secured provisional measures). Today, South Africa is doing the same to Israel for its mass murder of Palestinians.
Africa 🙌🏽
This, I think, is one of the purest and most radical acts of solidarity i have seen in recent times. To say this while grieving…hard to put into words.
"It's being said that my son was killed over suspicion of being a Muslim. Why would you kill Muslims? Are Muslims not human? You will kill any ordinary Muslim on the roads," said mother of Aryan Mishra.
Half of the country is burning up in a heat wave.
The other half is reeling under the deadly effects of cyclonic rains, river breach & ensuing landslides.
Dozens have died in the last 1 week because of these – in Mizoram, Assam, Bihar.
And he has gone to MEDITATE.
Surreal.
This should be taught across social science + architecture disciplines worldover as a case study of memoricide-through-renovation. The simplicity of the original setting was itself a historical artefact. It memorialised the pain. The makeover has disrupted that continuity.
Note the Hindutva modus operandi.
1. Provoke, provoke, provoke
2. Trigger minimal adverse reaction from other side (without state protection)
3. Respond with maximum violence (with state protection)
4. Blame whole thing on point 2.
(Many times, point 2 is fabricated).
So, the Hindu right in India wants secular and inclusive politics, but only in Bangladesh and Pakistan. In their own country, they want a Hindu Rashtra with a Hindu-centric party in power. Makes complete sense. 👍🏽
Forcibly displaced and rendered homeless in the middle of bone-cracking winters. Mostly Bengal-origin Muslim families.
Visuals from Bilasipara in Assam.
Source: Prag News /
In Himachal, a Hindutva mob attacked the Muslim man's shop in front of the police, looting and vandalizing it after he shared a picture of an animal sacrifice on his WhatsApp status.
Her bio says she founded an NGO for children. But here she is countering public outrage against violent mass slaughter of children with lame whataboutery that doesn’t even make any comparative sense.
“Engineered by Beijing”
“Stage managed by Islamists”
“CIA plot”
These are the kind of stale rhetoric that the Indian RW is pushing to explain Hasina’s downfall while completely ignoring the street movement led by the politically conscious youth of Bangladesh.
Peak mediocrity!
Haji Ashraf Munyar from a village in Jalgaon District travelling in a train to Kalyan to meet his daughter was abused and badly beaten up by goons in a train near Igatpuri alleging him of carrying beef.
URGENT UPDATE from Jagatpuri Police Station (Lakshmi Nagar):
Cops assaulted ICLU lawyers who went there to release a detainee. My female friend was slapped by a male policeman. Male cops also recorded videos of female lawyers.
Please take immediate action
@DelhiPolice
.
PM combatively defending the propaganda film. State after state making it tax free. CM announcing half-day leaves for gov employees to watch the film. Journos demanding exclusive screenings for military & police forces.
Never seen something like this in my living memory.
This happened today. Lawyers in
#DelhiHighCourt
during the farewell ceremony of
#JusticeMuralidhar
who has been transferred.
As they say, zulmi jab bhi zulm karega satta ke hathiyaro se, chappa chappa goonj uthega inquilab ke naaro se!
(Picture via Nandita Rao)
Not a single word of condemnation or even a diplomatic statement by
#India
on Israel's horrific massacre in
#Rafah
yesterday. Even Israel's oldest backers like France have called it out.
Tragic reflection of an acute crisis of morality & empathy that plagues our country today.
#KanganaRanaut
on
#RepublicTV
:
"These stars have drug dealers who supply the best stuff. If you go through my phone, you might find some of their numbers. But that's cos they took my phone to call them. I need protection cos if they expose me, I'll also be in trouble."
Lol wut
In India, things like
#PanamaPapers
or
#PandoraLeaks
don't bring down govts because the middle class here isn't offended by the rich parking their wealth in tax havens. In fact, they think its clever & aspire to do the same once they have enough wealth. Elite vertical mobility.
WATCH | Glimpses of air show by the aerobatic team of Indian Air Force
@Suryakiran_IAF
at the Rashtriya Ekta Diwas Parade in Ekta Nagar, Kevadia
@IAF_MCC
Can't wait for Mahua Moitra's fiery speech in the Parliament in razor-sharp English on how to fight fascism alongside new anti-fascist recruits like Babul Supriyo 😁
Lone CPI(M) MP from Rajasthan physically (& successfully) obstructing the bulldozing of houses of the poor for the construction of a highway. This is how elected reps should stand with the oppressed, rather than just protesting on the streets with the constitution.
नेता हो तो ऐसा
ये सीकर के नवनिर्वाचित साँसद
@AmraRamMPSikar
हैं जो गरीब लोगों के घरों को तोड़ने पर खुद जेसीबी के ऊपर चढ़े और प्रशासन की जबरिया करवाई को रोका. प्रशासन लोगों के घरों को तोड़कर गाँव के बीचों बिच से हाईवे बना रहा था लेकिन वो हाईवे गांव के बाहर से बायपास भी निकाला जा
Note that this depicts a Muslim man with a beard and skullcap making the comment *despite* the fact that it wasn’t actually a Muslim leader who made the comment. (Not even going into the clear threat of violence embedded in this cartoon.)
Some way to defend your religion, mate.
Imagine outraging over the status of minorities in Bangladesh day in & day out but not saying a single thing about the lynching & harassment of minorities in your own country.
Can someone properly explain why Trudeau would use the Khalistan issue for “vote bank politics”, as the Indian response claims? How can a Sikh population of just 2.1% become a “vote bank” significant enough for Ottawa to spoil the full breadth of diplomatic relations with India?
India is hardwired to mostly abstain on conflict agendas that don’t directly relate to its own security interests. But this was a needless abstention. The operative language of the resolution is pretty neutral & aligns with India’s overall position on the conflict. +
India abstains from voting on a non-binding UNGA resolution calling for an “immediate, durable and sustained humanitarian truce leading to a cessation of hostilities” in Gaza.
Myanmar (represented by pro-democracy, anti-coup
@KyawTun62907405
) voted in favour.
Resolution passed.
CISF officer in question seen in this footage saying Kangana had insinuated during the farmers’ protests that women from Punjab sat there for 100 rupees each.
“Meri maa baithi thi waha pe,” she says.
You can feel the anguish and hurt in her voice.
To understand the so-called "Israel-Palestine conflict", ask yourself this simple question:
Who is Israel's defence minister to stop power, food, gas supply to Gaza? What gives him so much authority over Palestinians?
The answer is as simple: occupation.
Days after a Muslim man was lynched to death in Aligarh, an FIR has been lodged against him and 6 others under charges of dacoity, assaulting women to outrage modesty.
Those who beat Aurangzeb to death on June 18 had claimed he entered a Hindu family's house to steal things.
So
#AAP
's Atishi Marlena was in
#Guwahati
yesterday for GMC polls. The party already has a growing presence in
#Assam
.
Certain statements made by the party yesterday on "Bangladeshis" and "Rohingya" now make a little more sense, I think.
More disinformation on
#Manipur
by
@republic
:
“Exclusive” footage shown here is from
#Myanmar
’s Kachin State, showing KIA troopers taking down a junta chopper with a MANPAD.
Republic claims to have corroborated the footage with
@manipur_police
. Shocking.
See 🧵for sources:
Very hard to believe that the BJP will come clean and allow its big fat account ledgers to be opened for public viewing before the upcoming election. Very hard.
Deeply unfortunate that a senior veteran of the Indian Army would make such claims & throw around numbers without any evidence whatsoever. That too when the CDS made it clear yesterday that the
#Manipur
situation has nothing to do with insurgency.
And “lungi clad ones”??
What happened to Bilkis Bano & her family in 2002, by all measure, is equivalent to a war crime & crime against humanity. Similar sexual brutality was doled out by the marauding Myanmar military to Rohingya women in 2016/17. The kind of crime that took Myanmar to the ICJ & ICC. +
Enough jokes. As if it wasn’t already gross, Indian media losing their heads over Ambani wedding is just nauseating. Violence & xenophobia in Manipur, NCW chief dismissing sexual assault concerns, bulldozing of Muslim homes, the slow death of Gaza – nothing else seems to matter.
Father of 15-yr old boy with mental illness tells him to "go to Bangladesh" in a fit of anger. Boy runs away & when caught by cops, tells them he is going to Bangladesh. Cops detain him, refer his case to Foreigners Tribunal & he is declared a foreigner.
Shashank Joshi, Sadanand Dhume, Tavleen Singh checking the “How to Justify Bombing of Universities” chapter of their “Justify it All: Israel Edition” manual
If Hindus vote in droves for BJP, that’s normal voting. If Muslims vote for Congress, that’s “strategic voting”.
(Notwithstanding the fact that Padmaja’s data analysis is also not completely correct).
Word of the Day: Strategic
One of the major reasons for the Congress-I.N.D.I.A surge across the country has been the consolidated and strategic voting by the Muslim community. Is it borne out by data? Yes
I, like many of my progressive friends, have no qualms in saying that Hindu minorities in Bangladesh need to be protected from attacks by Islamist mobs.
But can the Indian RW make a similar call to protect Indian Muslims from Hindutva mobs? Doubt it. That’s the difference.
The final stamp of liberalism is earned by paying obeisance to an Islamist cause. The 'student movement' has long been coopted and appropriated by fundamentalists but unless that is rationalised as 'revolucion', liberal stripes can't be earned.
Minorities be damned.
Short 🧵 (with help from the brilliant
@AbhishekSay
) on
@WirathuAshin
– an account using the identity of ultranationalist, Islamophobic Buddhist monk from
#Myanmar
to spew hate speech against minorities, including Kuki-Zo people. (1/n)
The liberal Meitei sophistry and spindoctoring has begun (as expected).
What is this JNU prof trying to say exactly? That the assault on the Kuki women has roots in the Partition?
Whom does he refer to when he says “separatist & exclusivist”? Kukis?
Shameless!
Modi gov sends an elite counterterrorism force to rein in local mobs in an opposition-ruled state. But it forgot to send them to a BJP-ruled state further east called Manipur where a heavily-armed militia has been holding the state hostage for months through violent intimidation.
If you are worried about a foreign gov harbouring anti-India militants, turn your eyes away from Canada (11000 km away) to Myanmar (right next door) where the military regime is sheltering non-ceasefire Meitei insurgent groups. Our gov is BFFs with that military regime.
His full remark: “This manifesto isn’t made for any Bharatiya. It’s made by some leftist, some mulla [Muslim] or some Pakistani.”
He is a sitting chief minister.
Nothing shocks anymore, and that’s the most shocking part.
Let's call this what it is — yet another Hindutva victory, and not some kind of liberal social reform. They literally got what they wanted.
Part of a step-by-step invalidation of the Muslim identity at every level of society and politics. Just sad.
Never too late, but the job was done. The unverified “intel input” relayed by the CM’s office was used to paint the Kuki-Zo as foreign aggressors. Large parts of the mainstream media that accept such “intel inputs” as gospel truths & reproduce them blindly are also to blame.
Manipur security adviser Kuldiep Singh and DGP Rajiv Singh issue statement that the “input of infiltration of 900 trained Kuki militants from Myanmar to carry out attacks on Meiteis on Sept 28 could not be substantiated on ground.”“There is no basis currently to believe in any
To those saying this is a purely election-time move — yes it is, but so what? That's how the democratic social contract works. Elected govs respond to popular pressure from the bottom primarily out of electoral concerns. There are no altruistic governments in modern democracies.
Personal update: happy to share that I have begun my PhD in Comparative Asian Studies jointly at National University of Singapore & King's College London.
Will be affiliated to the Dept of Geography at both places to work on Myanmar's borderlands.
One can’t miss the fact two of India’s eastern neighbours are witnessing historic people’s revolutions against their own tyrannical regimes, mostly led by young people.
One can’t also miss the fact that in both cases, New Delhi remains shy of acknowledging a new ground reality.
Beware of mainstream media reports on the situation in
#Manipur
. Most of them don’t reveal the full picture and simply parrot the state’s narrative. Best not to form views based on these one-sided accounts that use terms like “militants”, “insurgents”, “terrorists” recklessly.
Mind blowing hatred and communal jibes in the replies to such an innocuous tweet. It seems like no vocal Indian Muslim can talk about public life or apolitical issues in this country today without having to face bullying of the worst kind.
Saw this at a tube station at Rome and kept thinking why can’t all our metro and railway stations be disabled friendly? It doesn’t take much. Just empathy and action, both lacking in our authorities.
Notice how
#Mizoram
is starkly missing from the national discourse on assembly elections. No airtime in mainstream channels to discuss the politics of the state, let alone its nuances. Despite the fact that today’s results reveal a dramatic displacement of the ruling party!
Who is behind Licypriya? Who posts such dangerous, baseless stuff in her name? Isn’t it equivalent to child abuse?
Btw, AQIS is a bunch of low-grade violent losers who have lost their own plot & now pass random comments on whatever incident they can to shore up support. (1/2)
Why is a SWAT team entering a bomb threat site that isn’t even fully evacuated? Did they expect to exchange fire with the bomb?
And why are so many people still inside an “evacuated” building, with some even sitting on the front stairway? 😐
How is this a rational comparison? Do Indian Muslims use halal dietary practices to police or harass other communities in India? Even within Indian Muslims, is halal used as an internal hierarchical tool? Does halal receive informal patronage from the state? Wild.
This is a good time to talk about something that was true even before Modi came to power — how the Indian education system methodically drills nationalism into young minds, especially on Kashmir. At least, makes no attempt to foster critical thought or empathy. (1/2)
Today's forceful eviction of 800 Muslim families at Dholpur,
#Assam
, is a sign of worse things to come under HBS. Note that they weren't illegal settlers (altho no one, legal or illegal, should be treated with such cruelty). Meaning, this is a blanket war against minorities.
No counter-argument? No problem. Let’s just write “paid Kuki slave” or “Narco money expert”.
In all seriousness, this is the level of dehumanising and degrading abuse that the
#KukiZo
face on a daily basis.
Hello
@indiatimes
, Arakan Army is not a “Rohingya Muslim extremist group”. It’s an Arakanese ethnic armed organisation led by Rakhine Buddhists.
Maybe ask your reporters to do a basic fact check while writing pieces (or before dragging Muslims into every conflict)?
Somaiya School principal Parveen Shaikh says goodbye to her support staff on Tuesday. She was sacked after OpIndia targeted her for purported "pro-Hamas" and "anti-Hindu" views based on Tweets she had "liked".
Elections are NOT the only barometer of judging a democracy. The BJP has brazenly used state agencies & police to silence independent & dissenting voices, especially Muslims.
Today’s opposition victory was also about the people rejecting BJP’s authoritarianism.
One thing is for certain: Indian democracy is alive and well, kicking and flourishing - and is not backsliding. India should be at the top of these "democracy polls". Wonderful to see so many different parties and so many different reasons why people voted how they did - often
Where are the great progressive intellectuals of
#Assam
with their legendary "nuanced" theories about what's happening in their state?
Remember the people who stayed silent.
In an ideal democracy, the mainstream media would first question the government on its tall claims of securing J&K & its epic intel failure. Instead Kanwal is setting the narrative for another cross-border strike that will benefit no one but the Modi gov’s image. Peak godi.
Terrorists and their Pakistani handlers are testing the resolve of the new Modi government with successive attacks in the Jammu region. How should the army and the central government respond to this provocation? Is it time for another Uri-Balakote style cross border strike?
First piece in my new weekly column for
@htTweets
:
“The open border policy between
#India
and
#Myanmar
has a long historical legacy that needs to be preserved.”
The Free Movement Regime (FMR) might have been formalised in 2018, but it is much older.
Besides the fact that the law here is being twisted & applied as an emotive expression of majority sentiments, it’s tragic & infuriating that neither the state leadership nor the high command of
@INCIndia
has done anything to protect Javed. So much for standing up to Modi.
Javed's garment shop in Nahan town in Himachal Prahesh was attacked by members of right wing group for allegedly putting up pics of animal sacrifice on his WhatsApp status. He has been arrested by UP's Shamli police after an FIR was registered against him for promoting enmity.
Israel has killed 7000+ Gazans in less than 20 days. That includes 2300+ children.
Read those numbers again.
If this is Israel “walking a tight rope”, I wonder what folks like her think a “loose rope” looks like. Let me guess – complete erasure of all Palestinians?
Israel has always distinguished itself by warning civilians in advance of an attack very much unlike Hamas. Unfortunately, having cut communications it's hard to see how Gazan civilians will get the message. And where exactly are they supposed to go given that there are attacks
One year since
#Myanmar
's Permanent Representative to the UN, Kyaw Moe Tun, did something extraordinary — raise the three-finger salute to protest against the military coup back home.
What's even more extraordinary is that he continues to hold his post till date.
Request
@Cyberdost
@manipur_police
@mizorampolice
to take cognisance of this fake account impersonating a Burmese Buddhist monk to openly threaten ethnic cleansing of Kuki-Zo community.
Proof that it is a fake account:
Update: X has suspended the fake account peddling extreme hate speech against Muslims and Kuki-Zo people.
Do read the detailed
@AltNews
story by
@AbhishekSay
:
Short 🧵 (with help from the brilliant
@AbhishekSay
) on
@WirathuAshin
– an account using the identity of ultranationalist, Islamophobic Buddhist monk from
#Myanmar
to spew hate speech against minorities, including Kuki-Zo people. (1/n)
Can someone tell me why prominent Meitei intellectuals often put the word, Kuki, under quotes while not doing the same for their community? As if they are doubting the very existence of the Kukis or questioning their own endonym?
Full article in next tweet...
Really something that ANI has single-handedly created & perfected a whole new video genre of Hindutva political leaders and Hindu crowds giving way to ambulances during public rallies over the past few years. Some next level psych propaganda.
Shocking. A non-state armed militia administering a provocative “oath” to senior elected leaders in a BJP-ruled state. But hey, let’s blame the open border & FMR for the Manipur crisis. When the border is sealed, will this majoritarian vigilantism disappear?
Startling scenes from Manipur. Arambai Tenggol, an armed Meitei civil society group administers oath to MLAs and MPs to protect the integrity of Manipur. Seen here is former Congress CM O Ibobi Singh, MoS External Affairs Rajkumar Ranjan Singh and Rajya Sabha MP Leishemba
#WATCH
| Jammu and Kashmir: Batool Zehra, a college Ist year student from Uri sings Ram bhajan in Pahari language to connect J&K with the Ram Mandir Pran Pratishtha ceremony, to be held on 22nd January in Ayodhya, UP.
@CholoCrypto
Who rules Bangladesh now is a separate question. But no one can deny that the movement itself was home-grown and involved independent-minded young people. Revolutions are messy & unpredictable anyway, no one denies that.
Even if ONE person is turned back at a border because of their skin colour, there is no reason left to celebrate the 'magnanimity' of host countries.
Accepting refugees during wartime is the bare minimum. What's extraordinary (strangely) is accepting refugees without prejudice.
No regime can sustain rampant extrajudicial or quasi-judicial action like bulldozing houses as a form of punishment without popular social consensus. And this is how that consensus is systematically created 👇🏾
A pleasantly surprising pro-humanitarian position put forward by the serving Indian Army chief on refugees from Myanmar, while debunking unverified narratives of cross-border infiltration. Good to see a senior defence official recognise that people are crossing over for shelter.
The military is no longer a force for stability in
#Myanmar
. So, if
#India
wants a secure environment for its investments & projects, it must look elsewhere. I argue in today's
@IndianExpress
👇🏾
Some events in BJP-ruled
#Manipur
since 4 June: several dozen houses burnt down (incl the abandoned Imphal house of a former Kuki IAS officer), CM convoy’s advance security team fired at, a doctor’s house attacked with bombs, 2 trucks carrying construction material burnt down.
The BJP has formed a Committee to evaluate the incidents of political violence that have continued in West Bengal incessantly following the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Members of this committee will visit West Bengal and present a detailed report on the incidents to BJP National
#Meitei
Valley-Based Insurgent Groups (VBIGs) are getting involved in the
#Manipur
conflict. Was inevitable, in many ways. Notable that most of these militant groups are based in
#Myanmar
& are operating with the junta's blessings.
@psychia90
reports.