The Ground Reality of Khaps

 

Every community in India has its own type of social organization. Minority religions have their unique systems regarding marriage, divorce, etc. These are so unique that some of them are even beyond the reach of civil and marriage acts in the constitution. It means the Indian constitution allows diversity of culture and thought. The Khaps should basically be analyzed with a belief in this very concept. If so many distinct customs of marriage, divorce, property rights, which are even in stark contrast to other uniform laws in India, are allowed then why are khap panchayats judged with an exceptional, exclusive judgmental hammer ignoring so many unique cultural traits they define and defend regarding the Jat community. We have to understand that these are basically units of social organizations just like any other community in India and having its own utility and flaws.

 

Those who sit in the studios and blabber about the issue of honour killings should come out and see the ground realities related to honour killings. Ask the family where such incidences have taken place. They will tell it was the fear of getting marginalized by the mainstream society and the fear of stigma that drove them into the gruesome act. There have not been outright cases where the Khaps ordain honour killings. There have been some incidences when some injunctions cutting individual freedom were unfortunately ordained from the Khap chabutra, but in those cases it happens when things somehow reach the larger domain of the community and get politically motivated. In such cases these criminal acts need to be punished as per the law of the land. Don’t individuals commit murders? Does that mean that all of us should be put under scanner for being possible murders? Every individual, every institution in the domain of social, economic and political framework has its own versions of criminal acts. Does that mean that we should raise questions about their existence itself? Civilization thrives on reformation, not termination. Even the Britishers thought of reforming so many unique customs instead of gross termination.

 

Right from the Muslims to the people in down south, marriage customs are different in India. If Khaps have a stand against same gotra marriages then what is wrong with that? Genetically it has been proved that the more you move away from the genetic line of your parentage, the better are the offsprings. On what grounds we get judgmental? From the yardsticks of Hindu marriage customs, some customs related to certain communities will appear unacceptable. So just targeting a particular community regarding its marriage customs does not sound prudent and justified.

 

The biggest undoing with Khaps has been their spokesmen! Jats are basically farmers and count very low when it comes to being diplomatically correct. If put prudently even a slap may sound like a logical act born of some justified grievance. And if not put appropriately, even a justified act may appear like a gruesome act. That’s what Khap leaders have done to their system. Their ill-calculated statements regarding reduction of marriage age to cut down on rape, not allowing women to use mobile, codes regarding dress, etc., have brought ill-repute to Khaps. On the practical surface there is hardly any negative change in the lives of the girls and the women on account of such instructions, but yes after getting overhyped in the media Khaps sound like Taliban ever trying to enslave women. Before getting panicked whenever there is such an injunction by some Khap, kindly visit the respective areas and find out if there is a change in the lives of women. You would not find any perceptible change. But yes Khaps will definitely get demonized. Khaps become just self-injurious in such matters. It happens just once in a while when some old patriarch of the headgear generation gets panicked possibly on ulterior grounds and ordains something funny which does not have any effect on the ground level. So Khaps should have diplomatically correct and educated people as their spokesmen who know what they are saying and what might be the consequences.

 

If we just strictly look from the prism of modernity then most of the unique aspects of different communities will appear redundant. We are here to preserve distinctness, not to smother down diversity. Doing that just against Khaps does not sound like treating Jats equally with other communities in India. So many customs and ways of life related to many other communities also repeatedly rub against the shoulders of law. So reformation is the key objective, not annihilation. In this regard Supreme Court’s observations on Khaps appear unjustified.

 

Every social system having historical roots has and will serve a role. So to say that Khaps have become redundant is quite farcical. Khaps are passing through a generational shift. The old patriarchs still clinging to its top leadership sometimes over buzz the panic button. It has to be understood that many things that are happening are beyond their imagination. So the reaction! But most of the times their reaction has not any effect at the practical level. Once this generation bows out, brighter young people who are more educated will take charge of Khaps. We have to facilitate this generational shift in Khap leadership instead of tabooing them the Taliban way,

 

Peacock, the Beggar

 

The fields around my village are splashing with as much green paddy as possible. Monsoonal sun across the corners of the flying lumps of clouds gives the best glimpses of nature's bounty. But the travelling shadows also try to cover up silent, invisible man-made tragedies. Driven by intensive agriculture, born of costly inputs and decreasing landholdings, the farmers just mindlessly dump poison in all forms of pesticides, weedicides and insecticides. So this lush green is a merciless stroke of brush on the canvas of nature, swiping away the natural world of many insects, worms, reptiles and rodents that make nature holistic and encompassing in its game of give and take across the food chains. So guys, it’s just green paddy and the poisoned soil below.

 

Peacocks thrive on insects in the fields. All insects gone to the killing effects of the agro-chemicals, where would the foodless poor peacocks go? A peacock's plumage swinging to gentle breeze in open surroundings of the countryside is a treat, and we were lucky to witness it so many times during our childhood. Now the last or second last generation of these destitutes, who rarely get an insect in the fields, has descended in the village. An irony: the poison giver is somehow better than the poison itself, at least in the short turn. In the foliage of neem and acacia trees, they just pew out their miseries. To the infants and younger lot it still gives a chance to get them acquainted with the national bird's sound, and of course help them in learning the initials of human language.

 

My mom has an almost regular bird visitor, who perches upon the neem in our courtyard and pews out its begging song as if pleading, ‘Mai Roti do!!' While she dispenses her routine chores across the yard, it continues to draw her attention. Roti delayed, it is forced to descend and enter the inner reaches of the house just to make its presence felt through its luxuriant plumage. Once the roti is put in small pieces before it, it has to chuck up the offerings as fast as possible because crows line up in their accusing harsh tones, blaming it for being a transgressor who has infringed upon their rights. Crows are very clever. Some of them get behind its plumage and take a pick at its feathers to distract it. One defensive look behind and a few pieces stolen by the other crows waiting in the wings. I call it the 'beggar peacock', my mother does not like the title though.

 

If that is the fate of the national bird, it’s hard to imagine the condition of others. Looking at this marvel of nature, whom mom sometimes accuses of being 'namakharam'--when it comes without its plumage, all the feathers having been shed somewhere, and mom cursing it for being so mindless to waste them somewhere and not shed them in the courtyard--I just feel sad on account of the fact that may be it is the last or at the most second last in its lineage!!!  

 

 

My Friend Peelu

 

Weekends in the village are sort of rejuvenating moments. These are fast changing times. But village and villagers still hold onto lot of the so called outdated, traditional stuff which is both exciting and objectionable at the same time.

 

There is this street dog named 'peelu' that is getting stronger on collective offerings at various doorsteps. It belongs to all and to nobody at the same time. It will acknowledge your acquaintance by swaying its tail as you pass through the street and barks through the nights as the unofficial watchman of the area.

 

Soaked in weekend spirits, I decided to have a stroll by the village pond and the loyal animal, its tail taut as a mark of respect and loyalty, followed me to this village-side bunch-grass and shrubbery dotting the pond's shoreline. There was this donkey, medium built and really docile looking that caught my attention. A village is a village. I can recall so many moments from childhood when we had rides on donkey backs, held them by ears, sometimes three boys riding the same poor thing. Those reflections caught hold of me. There was this innocently rascal urge to hold this innocuous being by ears and go for a ride. There is always a child in us after all.

 

I tried to approach as harmlessly as possible. But just as my fingertips said hello to the animal's ears, it got unjustifiably offended. After all it’s the duty of a donkey to carry load man. But like most of us forgetting duties, it started flailing its legs in four directions. Panicked I took an evasive leap. This is where the dog decided to intervene from my side. Peelu, the carrier of this tag of being man's best friend from ancient times, gave a few more twists to the emblem of its bravery and loyalty, its tail, and attacked.

 

One simple fact: One should not reach the flailing range of a donkey legs from behind, even if you are a lion. The effort will award you with at least a broken jaw or rib. But then overzealous Peelu had to prove that he is worth all the chapattis we offer him. These are bad times man. Loyalty fetches you many bruises and few trophies. The poor thing got a good shot in its flanks. The impact found it rolling on ground. Then boy O boy, all the ideological stuff out of its brain, it ran at unheard of speed, its tail between legs, and whining that sounded more cursing me rather than the donkey.

 

'Peelu you idiot, how can you leave a friend in lurch like this!' I felt like shouting from behind. But it had forgotten everything. Just vanished out of sight. From a distance I said sorry to the offended animal. Man these are the days of empowerment across species. Gone are the days of those rightless, mute, uncomplaining animals of the past who gave us some of the best moments of our childhood. 'Sorry boss, this craving to ride your back without your permission was illegal and you are within your rights to create repercussions of that sort!' I said from a distance. It snorted and gave me angry, offended looks. I increased the distance between us lest it should carry the notion of justice too far and set after me.

 

Back in the village I saw my run-away friend. It limped and walked with its tail free to hang in any direction. 'Peelu how are you!' I said. It did not mind me too much now. Just turned its head a bit in my direction and simply walked away as if it was no longer interested in such risky friendships. 'But a friend in need is a friend indeed!' I thought of saying it loud and make it more bearable for him. But my friend was already out of sight. Bad days, very difficult to keep friendships alive.     

 

 

The Dragon will Eat Dust in WW III

 

In a hostel he stayed in Delhi for his civil services preparations, he came to be called as bada bhai by many IIT and medical aspirants preparing for their entrance exams. All of them were normal boys having pleasant mix of vulnerabilities and directionless strengths as conditioned by their teen years. But one chap stood out as Godzilla. It was not just on account of his size, for there were definitely some others who may also have been christened similarly if only size was the only criterion. What made him the common enemy was his arrogance and his effort to portray himself as the exceptionally powerful for the ordinary bunch of schoolboys around. He had a strange swagger in his walk that cried, ‘It’s between you and me!’ So guys it became an issue between one versus many. Confrontation was inevitable. One night many smaller ones pounced upon the hated Godzilla. War cry was: ‘Maro saale Godzilla ko!’ It resulted in—as it always happens in a conflict between one versus many (or few versus many)—a terrible defeat and consequent loss of face for the giant.

 

Guys, moral of the story is clear: Thousands of nice acts of civility and good behaviour may not fetch you even a single genuine friend, but an act of arrogance and aggression is definitely bound to fetch you many enemies. There have been WW I and WW II. The trigger point was the power going astray in some aggressive form of nationalism that puffed out belligerent winds in four directions. Aggression wins you very selected friends. So in both world wars, the so called axis powers had lesser parties to their boasting kitty and the so called allied powers were able to muster up the support of many nations across the world. Whatever may be the amount of bloodbath, the result inevitably has to be in favour of the allied powers, like it happened in both world wars. The fireball escaping its burning guts is ultimately bound to douse the genie. Moreover, the leadership of the allied powers earns the right to take world leadership.

 

China is going much on the pattern of axis powers presently. Its inflated sense of chronic nationalism has made it blind to the bitter facts of the previous world wars. The way dragon is hissing fire around it has all the potential to trigger a third world war. But believe it, Chinese missiles and bullets might taste enemy blood in all the nooks and corners of this world, but its defeat is inevitable and ordained by the laws that governed the first two world wars. What Hitler let out through his individual manic personality, the Chinese leadership is doing it collectively. Result: They have all enemies in its neighbourhood and across the world. In South Asian context, only a failed state can be counted as its real ally. If by dumping cheap exports in poor African countries, Chinese leadership has come to believe that it has dozens of allies, then it’s a gross miscalculation of strategic facts. By crossing all the limits of diplomatic niceties vis-à-vis India through claiming vast Indian territories as its own, it has taken its art of statecraft 70 year back to the Nazi era. By stepping on the toes of smaller nations around South China Sea, it has created a sort of one versus many situation. If there is a WW III, it must be believed that the Chinese fate cannot under any circumstances be better than the belligerent axis powers.

 

In cooperation with America, India can play a great role in this coalition of forces against the arrogant and blinded-by-power Godzilla and beat it like those smaller boys beat the bully who ran down the stairs utterly terrified and may be even pissed in its pants. Every Chinese act of belligerence driven by madly chronic, expansive nationalism is going to earn it more and more enemies. USA beat Russia in Cold War because there was NATO. It never trumpeted its status as the sole decider of world’s destiny, even though it could have done so. It always kept many allies to its side, even though they played a marginal part in its campaigns. It was symbolic support, far weightier than the coldly indifferent and aloof substance on the Soviet side. So China can carry on with its enemy-making juggernaut, the Indians will meanwhile cooperate with the Americans and China’s ever-longer list of enemies to beat the Mickey out of the Chinese in the possible WW III.

 

 

Was Indo-China 1962 Confrontation in Fact a War?

 

The retired brigadier’s eyes light up with action as the topic of Indo-China war is raised. As a 20-year-old second lieutenant he had led his team of Gurkhas in face-to-face and hand-to-hand fight with the Chinese around the Gurung Hill in the Western Sector. It was late November in 1962 and his memory captures the scenes 50-year-back like he remembers this morning breakfast. They had fought bravely unmindful of the shortage in man and material. The Gurkha Jemadar had fought with his khukri to save his life and was shot in the chest. The young second lieutenant survived but not before having a full experience of the events and happenings, when Indian soldiers’ bravery fell short before a weak political leadership and tremendous shortage of weapons. After that he had done well in the army, having done PhD in military science and retiring as Brigadier, a very impressive rank. He was now writing for a defense research website. As a first hand witness to the action he always had his own opinion hammered down on the brutal and bloody anvil of his own experience. Writing for the latest issue of the online magazine he had definitely raised a few eyebrows.  

 

We lost the war to China in 1962. Was it worthy of being analysed as a war? And put up such Himalayan psychological, defeatist dab on our young and exultant sense of nationalism? ‘War’ is unjustifiably too big an expression for these basically poorly planned skirmishes in the barren Himalayan terrain, where hardcore war strategies and ironclad nationalism melted into the anonymous mists of those far-fetched undefined barren territories. We had no plan at all, except the vague idea about our boundary lines. They had a stronger idea about what they thought belonged to them. It was merely a school-boyish mad rush into uninhabited wilderness to find some larger meanings which no side had a definite idea about. So the anecdotes are full of chance skirmishes, futile bravados and disproportionate hoopla about the proportions of battle engagements.

 

As a newly independent country, we accepted the word 'war' to qualify on the scale of capability to defend the new-found sovereignty and territories. This mere acceptance of the expression 'war' for those rudimentary childish pursuits in the wild snowy trails has done us more psychological and historical harm than the real casualties on the battle field. The stage was too hazy and distant. In the wide nook and corners of India, we grew up with this massive war defeat scar that was in fact in terrible disproportion to the scale of real operations. Admitted, China rushed in to grab a considerable proportion of the territories in Aksai Chin where our claim of ownership was just stamped by symbolic patrols and traditional belief. But losing a chunk of land over which we never had the time and capability to fully stamp our ownership, does no justice to the fact of accepting some free runs in barren lands as a humiliating defeat in a full-scale war. We just lost a few not so pitched battles, that’s all! We ourselves get hyper about the word 'war' to somehow exaggerate the scale of military operations (we as the defendants of our territories and Chinese as the greedy grabbers) to legalize our victimhood and their crime act. And for this we just accept the insulting defeat in a bloody war.

 

More than fifty years on, what is the ground position in the actually held territories? We have all the reasons to smile and give ourselves a pat on the back and bury that scar, even if it means with a cosmetic sense of belated belief. The strength of any military unit is directly proportional to its real-life practice in the field. In mountain warfare we far outdo China. Thanks to Messer Pakistan and Co. we have been busy in mountain warfare for more than six decades. When you are fighting against the invisible enemy and try to keep your humanitarian records clean as well, it really gives you the bloodiest war drills. It has been going on against insurgencies at both the Eastern and Western fronts in the toughest Himalayan terrains. It has been at tremendous costs at the man and material fronts. But believe me it has put our forces through such fiery experiences that it can be really counted as one of the most battle-worthy force in mountainous regions.

 

Chinese military bragging meanwhile has been limited to nationalist gung-ho, hoopla and technological innovations. But there is a great difference between getting starry eyed over a new warfare gadget and getting into the real mess of a bloody situation where you have to kill the hidden enemy, spare you people and keep the thing of law in your mind in the snowy heights. We are a far superior military force, on account of our constant real-life drills, in the terrain that are in dispute with China.

 

Indian Navy still scores over China. It is not about having the biggest dagger in the world. What matters is that your dagger should be just long enough to reach the enemy’s heart and you should have, first, the intention, and second, the strength to push it that deep. I mean the nukes! Equipped with this deterrence, we are logically capable of engaging Chinese in--both limited and not-so-limited--conventional mountain warfare. We have invested so much money into air warfare equipments, at the cost of depriving millions of people of basic amenities of life. However, it at the minimum gives us all the reasons to practically maintain our supply chains in the toughest terrain. So Indians forget about a few skirmishes lost to China in 1962 and be optimistic about future.