WRITER Amit Chaudhuri AMIT CHAUDHURI is the author of eight novels, the latest of which is Sojourn . He is also an essayist, poet, musician, and composer. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Awards for his fiction include the Commonwealth Writers Prize, the Encore Prize, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Fiction, and the Indian government's Sahitya Akademi Award. In 2013, he was awarded the inaugural Infosys Prize in the Humanities for outstanding contribution to literary studies. His first novel, A Strange and Sublime Address , is included in Colm Toibin and Carmen Callil's The Modern Library: the 200 best novels of the last 50 years, and his second novel, Afternoon Raag , was on the novelist Anne Enright's list of 10 best short novels for the Guardian. Its 25th anniversary edition appeared last year with a new introduction by the critic James Wood. He is a highly regarded singer in the Hindustani classical tradition and has been acclaimed as a pathbreaking composer and improviser who performed, most recently, at Queen Elizabeth Hall, London. In 2017, the government of West Bengal awarded Chaudhuri the Sangeet Samman for his contribution to Indian classical music. He is Professor of Contemporary Literature at the University of East Anglia, and was University College London's Annual Visiting Fellow in 2018. That year, he was also an inaugural fellow at the Columbia Institute of Ideas and Imagination in Paris, and in 2019 became an honorary fellow at Balliol College, Oxford. WRITER WEBSITE INSTAGRAM TWITTER Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 LOAD MORE

With internet services partially restored and the curfew relaxed, the government in Bangladesh is spinning bizarre narratives about student protesters. Sheikh Hasina and the Awami League have variously labeled the protesters as both innocent and as Pakistani collaborators in the 1971 Liberation War. They have also alleged that students were misled by terrorists. Meanwhile, extrajudicial arrests of students continue. THE VERTICAL Update from Dhaka III With internet services partially restored and the curfew relaxed, the government in Bangladesh is spinning bizarre narratives about student protesters. Sheikh Hasina and the Awami League have variously labeled the protesters as both innocent and as Pakistani collaborators in the 1971 Liberation War. They have also alleged that students were misled by terrorists. Meanwhile, extrajudicial arrests of students continue. VOL. 2 OPINION AUTHOR AUTHOR AUTHOR Quota (2024), digital artwork, Nazmus Sadat. ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: AUTHOR Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 AUTHOR Heading 5 Quota (2024), digital artwork, Nazmus Sadat. SHARE Facebook ↗ Twitter ↗ LinkedIn ↗ Opinion Dhaka 23rd Jul 2024 Opinion Dhaka Quota Movement Fascism Student Protests Bangladesh Awami League Sheikh Hasina Police Action Police Brutality Economic Crisis 1971 Liberation of Bangladesh BTV Zonayed Saki Internet Crackdowns Internet Blackouts BSF Abu Sayeed Begum Rokeya University Abrar Fahad BUET Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology Mass Protests Mass Killings Torture Enforced Disappearances Extrajudicial Killings Chhatra League Bangladesh Courts Judiciary Clientelism Bengali Nationalism Dissent Student Movements National Curfew State Repression Surveillance Regimes Repression in Universities Argentina's Military Dictatorship Dhaka Medical College Hospital Doosra Fake News Razaakars July Revolution Student-People's Uprising Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. EDITOR'S NOTE: SAAG received this piece along with other media organizations on 23rd July, with another update the following day. Part of it was published by The Wire. We chose to publish the piece lightly edited, in keeping with the author’s wishes. Due to the urgency of its message, it has not been fact-checked in accordance with regular editorial processes. The views expressed in this piece are the author’s and do not necessarily represent SAAG’s editorial stance. —Iman Iftikhar 22nd July There is a particular type of bowling in cricket called “the Google” or “the Doosra.” It is a rare spin ball that is meant to trick the batsman—one only a few bowlers have mastered. Good batsmen and women, however, can tell from the way the bowler’s arm or wrist acts which way the ball will spin and play accordingly. Except in the case of the deceptive Doosra. Many a famous scalp has been taken by the well-executed Doosra. In Bangladeshi politics, it is actually the infamous spin doctors themselves who seem to be falling prey to the Doosra, the outcome not going quite the way they intended. Bangladeshi citizens are faced with a dilemma. The coming 48 hours may be a “general holiday,” as declared by the government. The quota students, on the other hand, have declared a “complete shutdown.” The Army chief, Waker-Uz-Zaman, announced on TV that the army had brought things under control and the country is heading back to “normal.” At the same time, however, there are soldiers in the streets enforcing an ongoing curfew with orders to shoot to kill. A curfew isn’t what one associates with a general holiday, though sadly, killing unarmed citizens could be considered normal in Gaza or Kashmir. In Bangladesh, with no Internet, no cash, no banking services, and with people using pay-as-you-go accounts for gas and electricity on the verge of having their connections closed down due to non-payment, one wonders whether this really will become the new normal. The “shutdown” moniker makes some sense. Most shops are closed, and while there are people on the streets, especially in the hours when the curfew is called off, the city is tense (the curfew was relaxed today from 10 am to 5 pm. Offices and banks are to be open from 11 am to 3 pm). The only people venturing out any distance away from home, whether or not they have a curfew pass, are those on essential duty: hospital staff, journalists, and fire-fighters. People can be seen in the back streets, where there appears to be no military or police presence, but there are also reports of people being hunted down and killed in alleyways, a source of intense fear. The policing is site-specific. The Maghreb azaan floats across Rabindra Sharani, the outdoor recreation centre in the well-to-do residential area of Dhanmondi. There are no security forces here. Young women and men walk by the lakeside after dusk. Puppies frolic by the amphitheatre as kids play football and parents walk toddlers on the stage. I am also told that life is “normal” in the upmarket tri-state areas of Gulshan, Baridhara, and Banani. Diplomats and decision-makers live there, and it wouldn’t bode well to have an overt military presence in such areas. These are the normal zones. Mohammadpur, less than a kilometre away from Rabindra Sarani, is a curfew zone. Topu, the Head of the Photography Department of Pathshala, the South Asian Media Institute which I founded, rings me at around 7:30 pm to tell me that a graduate student Ashraful Haque Rocky has been picked up by the police. Luckily, he has a press card as he used to work for a prominent newspaper. They’ve taken his camera away, but so far, he’s not been roughed up. We’re trying to get someone from the newspaper to call the police to make sure he is not physically harmed or disappeared. We anxiously await more information from the police station. After lobbying through multiple sources, a message comes in just before midnight that Rocky has been released. He has his camera. For the moment, we know nothing more. News trickles in through our network that anyone taking injured students to the hospital, even if they are helpful bystanders, is getting arrested by plainclothes police. Injured students are arrested as soon as they are well enough to be released. They don’t always get beaten up or put in jail; sometimes, they are just extorted. A friend’s brother was released upon paying a ransom of one lakh taka, just short of $1,000, worth a lot of money in Bangladesh. Newspapers also report Nobel Laureate Muhammad Yunus bucking the government narrative with a statement to the international community on Monday, “Bangladesh has been engulfed in a crisis that only seems to get worse each passing day. High school students have been amongst the victims.” 23rd July Local news channels reported last night that there had been “no untoward incident,” though a friend provided eyewitness reports of two students and two passersby being killed by the police in the Notun Bazar area of Dhaka. A young rag picker was shot dead in a different part of the city. She also talks of the smart tanks stationed outside her house in Gulshan. Foreign Minister Hasan Mahmud summoned the diplomatic community to brief them on the current situation with a presentation. It didn’t go quite as planned. Unusual for diplomats, the UN Resident Coordinator asked the FM about the alleged use of UN-marked armored personnel carriers and helicopters to suppress protesters. The outgoing US Ambassador Peter Haas, who had been instrumental in the US government’s sanctions against the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) for its human rights abuses, was the one to respond to the FM: “I am surprised you did not show the footage of police firing at unarmed protesters.” There are dissenting voices among civil society personnel despite the fear and repression. 33 eminent citizens have asked the government to apologize unconditionally to citizens for the deaths of protesters since 16th July. The Communist Party of Bangladesh has demanded fresh general elections, while Rashtra Sanskar Andolan (Movement for State Reform) has demanded the government’s resignation. 25 women’s rights activists and teachers termed the Supreme Court’s verdict on the quota system “a trap to confuse the ongoing just protests against the fascist government.” 24th July My partner, Rahnuma, and I are both aware that martyrs don’t do good reporting. Working with limited resources, along with our wider team of dedicated activists, we’ve been looking out for each other. I’ve been out on the streets, on most occasions Rahnuma being my bodyguard. Even in this warlike environment, some show solidarity and want updates. A few even ask for selfies while heavy-set Awami League types scowl from a distance. Curfew and trigger-happy security forces have made it difficult to visit friends in the hospital, find safe homes, and get supplies. Finding ways to beat the Internet ban and get messages such as this one out has been far from easy. We’ve managed so far. It is for you readers to take the next steps to freedom. The broadband connection was restored last night, but selectively. We now have email and WhatsApp access at home, but no YouTube or Facebook, nor social media. My niece, two roads down, has none. Meanwhile, the spin doctors are working overtime. The students, who were called “razaakars” (war of liberation collaborators) a week ago, then became “komolmoti shishu” (sweet innocent kids) a few days later, and are now “obujh chhatro” (naive students) whom the “dushkritikari o jongi” (miscreants and terrorists) have exploited. The PM met with the business community on Monday afternoon. They were concerned about the effect this “problem” has had on the nation’s economy. Part of the discussion was aired on TV. The PM absolved the quota protesters of any ill deeds and reminded us that they were not the reason the army had been brought in. Strange then that one of the protestors' demands is that all charges against them be dropped. There is silence about the ongoing arrests of students. The spin doctors are working overtime to fit the quota protests, which spilled over into a nationwide uprising, into the government’s hold-all explanation, “the BNP-Jamaat-Shibir are responsible.” They will not be spared. They are the ones trying to hold back the country and turn back the development process. The entire cabinet nods. Some of the party faithful come to the podium to hail the PM for her leadership and for thwarting the opposition’s evil plans so successfully. They assure her that the nation will continue in its glorious journey under her able leadership. They would like her to be Prime Minister “for life.” The images of Sheikh Hasina and her father, Bangabandhu (friend of Bengal) Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, plastered on every wall across the country, the billboards and banners that litter the countryside, the Bangabandhu corner, required by law to be present in every library and prominently placed at the airport and all-important buildings, collectively create a North Korea-like adulation of the great leader. As in North Korea, the Bangladeshi leader has total control. The Argentinian army’s loss in the Malvinas (Falklands) Islands, while a loss for the nation, resulted in an unexpected gain. It broke the aura of the army’s invincibility, which allowed the resistance to build and eventually overthrow the military regime. It was one of the few instances where military rulers have been brought to trial. This aura of invincibility is important for the leadership to maintain. That is why the photo of the soldier on the receiving end of a flying kick by a student way back in 2007 was quickly hushed up and has disappeared from official archives. It is probably also the reason why the recent attack on the home minister’s house, though instigated by the helicopter fire on protestors down below in the first place, never made it to print and electronic media. Even the acknowledgment of such temerity, even if provoked, is dangerous. The business community needs the Internet to be up and running immediately. The downtime is costing them, and they are getting agitated. The great leader informed them that she had explained everything to the naive students, and they had understood. The students were no longer the problem. What was to be tackled were the terrorists and the miscreants, which she would take care of. You don’t bite the hand that feeds you. The business community knew where the red lines were and was careful not to cross them. They bowed and retreated. The media in Bangladesh long stopped behaving as the fourth estate and has morphed into a PR network for their corporations and for the government. With extremely rare exceptions (the daily New Age being one), independent media has perished. Embedded journalism is the norm. The few free-thinking journalists who still survive in this space worry about the moles surrounding them. Media owners confide that their headlines are dictated by military intelligence. Their own culpability, they conveniently ignore. Even the headlines, some say, are dictated by security agencies. Even so, there are brave journalists who do what journalists must. Rigorous research. Detailed fact-checking. Connecting the dots. Good reporters find holes in the spin doctor’s statements, who are caught in their own web of lies. Different ministers making contradictory statements create traps for each other. Why the police opened fire and killed “komolmoti shishus” is not an easy question to answer. If the attackers were BNP and their allies, why they were chanting pro-Sheikh Hasina slogans is also unexplained. If there was nothing to hide, why, after the claim that the internet shutdown was due to a technological issue was debunked by the industry experts, was the Internet still down? The government accuses international agencies who are reporting on the situation, of providing fake news. Why, then, is Dhaka Medical College Hospital refusing to provide figures for the dead and injured? In recent years, tyrants across the globe have often deployed the “fake news” accusation to deny human rights violations that are abundantly clear to the public and the rest of the world. They’ve also used the full spectrum of repressive state machinery, including media, to deny culpability and hide their own guilt. They have also banded together to share resources and copy from each other’s playbook. Sheikh Hasina, a long-standing member of the tyranny club, has been playing the game for some time. But arrogance has its drawbacks. It would be wrong to underestimate the public, and the Doosra can only take one so far. Especially when the spin doctors seem to be getting wrong-footed by their own ball. ∎ More Fiction & Poetry: Date Authors Heading 5 Date Authors Heading 5 Date Authors Heading 5 Date Authors Heading 5 Date Authors Heading 5 Date Authors Heading 5

Violent clashes along the Assam-Mizoram border have a 150-year-old history. The recent border flare-ups may appear most visibly in the superficial disputes of state parliaments, but they have, in truth, roots in both militarism and political economy—particularly the illicut trade of the areca nut—that undergird the construction of ethnic identities. FEATURES Assam, Mizoram, and the Construction of the "Other" Violent clashes along the Assam-Mizoram border have a 150-year-old history. The recent border flare-ups may appear most visibly in the superficial disputes of state parliaments, but they have, in truth, roots in both militarism and political economy—particularly the illicut trade of the areca nut—that undergird the construction of ethnic identities. Joyona Medhi · Abhishek Basu In July 2021, violent clashes along the “no-man’s land” border between Assam and Mizoram erupted, the latest in a conflict that dates back to over a century . This time, however, the clashes were accompanied by a battleground along party lines. In the lead up to India’s 75th Independence Day, Mizoram, the only remaining non-Saffronised, Congress-backed state in the northeastern region of India, seemingly became a target for India’s ruling party, the BJP, and its project to establish politically motivated “peace.” The seven sister states in the northeastern part of India are well acquainted with sporadic bouts of violence along their borders. The dispute along the border between Assam and Mizoram centers around contentious claims about where the exact border lies. Mizoram claims 509 square miles of the inner-line reserve forest under an 1875 border demarcation, a claim Assam rejects based on a demarcation in 1933. In turn, this contentious space has long become a locus for the political aspirations of both regional and central ruling parties and powerful groups. Following the violent clashes in July 2021, news reports quoted villagers in Mizoram as describing the situation as “a war between two countries.” The optics were indeed strange: two police forces of the same country—albeit different states—engaged in a violent shootout against each other. 48 hours before the first clashes, India’s Home Minister Amit Shah had met with the Northeast Democratic Alliance (NEDA) to discuss the possibility of a border settlement. Over the next few weeks, the series of police firings that began in Kareemganj, Hailakandi, spread to the Cachar district of Assam. The renewed conflict has deeper roots: on a macroscopic level, contemporary political, cultural, and economic structures continue to bolster the active construction of enemies, within and without, for both the Assamese and the Mizo populations. What appears to be behind the violent clashes along the 165km-long fluid border—alarming in breadth and scope—in the region is a complex game of both ethnic identity politics as well as the central government’s agenda of putting an end to the Burmese supari or areca nut (often called betel nut) trade, an economy in which locals from both states are involved. The import of Burmese areca nut is now illegal in Mizoram , but continues to feature in vested economic and political interests that make up the fragile peace along the Assam-Mizo border. Assam has unresolved border disputes with all four of the largely tribal states that have been carved out of it since Independence. This past November, at the border with Meghalaya, the Assam Police killed six people . In each case many diverse communities in the hilly and forested northeastern region are imbricated, with many array of exports; in each case, the conflict is oversimplified in mainstream media narratives which ignore how identity and political economy become intertwined, and few point out the common charge placed on Assam: that much of its incursions occur without consent and punishment, and regularly trammel either already-codified or customary rights that communities have over their lands. Recently, much was made of an agreement between Assam and Mizoram in the form of a joint statement. While the statement by both the state governments to amicably resolve the matters of unrest along this border have reached the third round of talks, a high-level delegation from Mizoram expressed that "there has been huge unrest among the areca nut growers in Mizoram on account of problems being faced in the transportation of their produce to Assam and other parts of the country." The joint statement also seemed to flatten the nature of the conflict, simply stating that "economic activities such as cultivation and farming along the border areas would be allowed to continue regardless of the administrative control presently exercised by either state at such locations... subject to forest regulations and after informing the deputy commissioners concerned." The problem of the in-between in this region, however, cannot be mitigated with such generalities which highlight a kind of identity performance about border disputes that tie into political parties' agendas. This past December, the opposition in the Parliament of Assam staged a walkout , aggrieved about the perceived lack of action against Mizoram after a school in Cachar district of Assam was allegedly occupied by Mizo students. Meanwhile, the plight of local areca nut farmers goes generally unnoticed in Parliament. December 2022, six vehicles carrying areca nut into Mizoram were set ablaze , allegedly by Central Customs and Assam Rifles, which regularly prevent the export of areca nut from Mizoram and Tripura by seizing them at the border. Regardless of the party responsible, an areca nut growers' society in Mizoram, Hachhek Bial Kuhva Chingtu Pawl (HBKCP) argues that farmers are suffering because the Assam Police are unable (or unwilling) to verify if areca nuts from Mizoram are local or foreign. The Mizoram government too has come under fire for its laxity with smuggling, or care for farmers. Despite the entangled politicking and trade relations between Assam and Mizoram, however, there is a deeper history of the Mizo peoples being seen as the “other.” This has only intensified in recent years, as has the illicit trade of the areca nut. Whether borne out of an acute sense of cultural or political difference, the stereotypes that circulate in Assam deploy the Mizos’ native language, their Western convent education, or their land use, to construct notions of fundamental differences in identity. Who “they” refers to, however, as is often the case, is vague and context-dependent. The Assamese in general seem to mean the Mizos, but locals often mean politicians, police mean locals, and locals may also mean their wives, many of whom hail from villages across the border. In 2021, we visited the village of Lailapur, in the Cachar district of Assam, where residents had pelted stones at policemen from Mizoram who had previously clashed in 2020 with residents of Vairengte, a town in Mizoram’s own Kolasib district, exemplifying how any border is insufficient to explain the blurred nature of the conflict. Imtiaz Akhmed a.k.a. Ronju, was born and grew up in Lailapur. He is one of several truckers who ferry goods such as areca nut and black pepper between Assam and Mizoram (goods that are smuggled into India from Myanmar, Thailand, Malaysia, or Indonesia). He also has a Mizo wife, and claims that their son has the cutest mixture of the facial features of the two sister states, while simultaneously asserting that there are fundamental differences between the Assamese and Mizo peoples. A few locals of Lailapur who helped set up an electric pole for this shed/post of the Assam police officers wait for permission to go and have lunch at their homes on the other side of the police barricades, in Lailapur. Courtesy of Abhishek Basu. From Ronju’s perspective, the areca nut trade is at the core of the conflict on a local level: “What can we do if the betel nut is cheaper on that side? They [the Mizos and the Burmese] have been in this business for long enough to establish a monopoly. A kilo of betel nut sells for INR 128 there, while it's INR 300 here.” But despite the monopoly, working in Mizoram has its advantages for Ronju. “I have big connections with ministers [in Mizoram] who make life easier for me by way of permissions. I get supari here for the Assam State Police at times too! Currently, my truck, loaded with tatka [tight] Burmese supari, is waiting at the border because of the blockade. The Mizos themselves will help unload it on this side though,” he cackled. Ronju emphasizes difference, but his family and work hint at complex aspects of lived reality in towns along the border. Of course, the complexities are often cynically flattened by local political parties who rely on enflaming the conflict. Soon after the initial clashes last year, Assamese politicians and ministers arrived in Lailapur. The press, both local and national, flocked to them in front of a police barricade. The Organizational Secretary of the Assamese political party Veer Lachit Sena (VLS), Srinkhal Chaliha told the media, “We will not tolerate any threat. The Assamese people will give an appropriate reply!” Locals and groups most impacted by the clashes observed the spectacle. They crowded on both sides of the narrow highway that leads to Lailapur and ends at the Assam Police barricade, located 5 kilometres away from the actual border. Several witnesses shook their heads in disappointment over what they perceived to be the Assam government's cowardice: to many, not giving statements at the border itself, or not strongly condemning repeated acts of aggression from the Mizo side of the border—where many local civilians are believed to have been seen by the Assam State Police officers—seen equipped with light machine guns (LMGs) provided to them by alleged extremist groups backing the ruling Mizo National Front (MNF) government. It is important to note that Mizoram is the only state among the seven sister states of Northeast India that has yet to turn saffron, or be in alliance in any way whatsoever, with the right-wing BJP (despite short-lived alliances with the BJP and MNF part of the BJP-led coalition at the Centre, in Mizoram the party has historically allied itself with Congress ). The strong response expected from the Assamese government to counter repeated jibes from the Mizos, however, never materialized. Ronju, a local businessman, explained: "One call from the Mizo Church and MZP (Mizo Zirlai Pawl, a powerful student organization with a long and antagonistic history with the Centre and a shared relationship with the ruling MNF), and you will find village after Mizo village come together in solidarity, bearing arms like LMGs (lightweight machine guns) that too! There's nothing like that here in Assam. We're too divided." He added that he was proud of having driven through the perilous Mizo terrain all the way to Aizawl, the capital of Mizoram, several times. Ronju, who is a seemanto-bashi or a border resident, holds similar views as many of the locals standing along the highway leading to the barricades. They expect the Assamese government to take a strong stance in the face of perceived Mizo homogeneity and solidarity, as well as support from the Church. The juxtaposition of Mizo identity and Assamese nationalism is reflected in geographical landmarks along the border: the last Indian symbol on the Assamese side is a temple and on the Mizo side, a Church. Many locals on the Assamese side of the border as well as the second in command of the CRPF (Central Reserve Police Force, India's largest Central Armed Police Force) battalion posted in Fainum, Assam, talk about Mizos as if they were a warrior tribe. They believe that Mizos kill on a whim; accentuate their cultural differences, food preferences and eating habits; and speak Mizo instead of Hindi or English. Such sentiments strengthen the perception that there are fundamental differences between the two communities, despite their obvious closeness either in proximity, occupation, or familial ties. "They believe they are Mizos first. For them, the [Indian] nation is secondary. Someone needs to sit down and reason with them," says S. Debnath, Barak Valley resident and former member of the Forum for the Protection of Non-Mizos. Debnath believes Mizos feel like this because of particular state practices: “There's the case of the Inner Line Permit mandatory for anyone wishing to enter Mizoram, which makes them [the Mizos] feel like they have a sovereign right to their land. They allow the Burmese in when it comes to the business of Burmese supari, but not people like us who are from other states of India." Mizoram also enjoys other affordances that allow Mizos to take autonomous decisions, like the Inner Line Permit (ILP), which evidently frustrates the residents of the Hindu-majority Barak Valley of Assam. Debnath, like several others, does not consider metrics such as Mizoram's literacy rate, population size, and economic growth that are used to explain their sovereign status—most of which comes from tribal autonomy guaranteed over the Lushai Hills, provided for in Schedule Six of the Indian Constitution. Mizoram has one of the country's highest literacy rates. Its Oriental High School is among the first convent schools established by the British in Silchar, an economic hub in the contested Barak Valley of Assam. The school also has residential quarters for their mostly Mizo staff and teachers who form a large part of the closely-knit Mizo community in Assam. Since the Mizo Church is reluctant to involve itself in the local politics of the region, the staff and teachers at Oriental High School have been asked not to share their political opinions and to stay entirely professional. Rati Bora, another seemanto-bashi , has two sons who work on farms on either side of the border. Her son who works on the Mizo side earns more than his brother, presumably because Mizoram’s economy is one of the fastest growing in the country. On July 26, 2021, Rati Bora heard the shots fired by policemen on both sides of the border and feared for her life. Her sons begged her to evacuate. She left home with her family members and elderly parents and headed for her sister’s house in the neighboring town of Silchar. The incident was terrifying for border residents like Rati at that time. Now, however, the local tea shops opened by a few families dwelling right beside the police check post in Dholakhal are flourishing, she says. Rati Bora overlooking her patch of green, now taken by the CRPF to establish camps and diffuse tensions between the two states of Assam and Mizoram. Singhu, Assam, India. Courtesy of Abhishek Basu. We watched as four local boys from the Cachar district of Assam struggled to set up an electric pole. The pole would serve as a post for the state police that would be stationed there at night for a few weeks. Later as the boys crossed the police barricade to eat their lunch of bhaat (rice) at their homes, we watched as onlookers stared at them with suspicion. Young men from bordering villages must always keep their aadhar ID cards on themselves, and even guests visiting their homes must carry their identification documents. The performativity of nationalism takes on a certain intensity for residents of this region. Locals like Ronju and Rati are intimately familiar with this performance, and with an eye to the cross-border trade, tend to hold a more nuanced view of the changing economy of Silchar. “[Despite the suspicion and discrimination], at least now seemanto-bashis from Lailapur and Sighua villages are getting some recognition,” says Rati. “Previously girls wouldn't ever want to get married to boys from here, like my two sons. Now at least there's a chance. It's not so remote anymore… there are so many SUVs and Boleros zipping by,” she says, referring to the many politicians she had seen in her area. Taking us away from the blame game at play in this region is the plight of the injured policemen of the Assam State Police, a few still waiting for doctors to remove pellets shot from the handmade guns of Mizo locals. Stuck in a rut because of delayed discharge papers and an inaccessible, unresponsive healthcare system, the policemen have issued multiple statements on maintaining peace and order in the region that are very similar to those of their politicians. Some policemen wrap the pellets removed from their bodies in delicate tissue paper and keep them in their pockets as a token of pride. Some of them eagerly share videos they recorded on their smartphones or shared by villagers on the Mizo side of the border. Until a time comes when the region’s employment issues are solved instead of vague assurances that the help mandated by the Employment Guarantee Act; until a time comes when roads are developed, middlemen are erased, the indigenous industry is promoted excluding the existing large tea and oil businesses; until a time comes when Assam helps itself and not its vote-banks, it will not be able to hide behind the central government’s exclusionary tactics of us and them. Like the rest of India, the northeast too may well fall into the trap of not asking the right questions to those in power, especially at a time the Indian economy is reeling from the shortages of resources in the wake of the COVID-19 crisis. It comes down to the possibility of the Assamese being able to reclaim everything considered “illegal” about the Burmese areca nut trade. This involves cracking down on people like Ronju, their very own, who act like oil in these cracks. It is not enough to just roll the areca nut by placing it below your tongue, it is to recognize that cultures when living in proximity, obviously are bound to inform and resemble each other. We saw many a xorai or a casket-like plate in almost every Assamese household we went to, and were offered the traditional areca nut and paan, or betel nut palm. Such an act is a symbol of “welcoming outsiders,” they told us. This contrasts starkly with an occasion in one of our interviews with Debnath where he lowered the volume on the television upon hearing a TV anchor complaining about protests organized by Mizo student organizations against the draconian Indian Citizenship Act: the same legislation designed to kick out “outsiders” from Indian soil. For the Mizos, it is Bangladeshis who are the outsiders and indeed they often consider even the moniker of “Bangladeshi” disparaging. Meanwhile, for Debnath, it is the Mizos who are more of an “other,” more so than those who agree to live illegally in India. The dynamics between the Mizos, the Bangladeshis, the mainland Assamese, and the active construction of the “other” is at the heart of this story and the continuing clashes. To fully understand what’s going on at Lailapur, it is important to understand that this polarized strand of history is deeply etched in the memory of the Mizos of this generation. At the same time, it is undoubtedly true that there are two competing narratives—one told by the natives and the other by government officials. The first tells a tale of the oral ethnocultural history of the tribe linked to the land and forests: the narrative of many Mizos and organizations like the MZP. The second is the “official” history of state formation: the Assamese state narrative, if not that of India writ large. ∎ In July 2021, violent clashes along the “no-man’s land” border between Assam and Mizoram erupted, the latest in a conflict that dates back to over a century . This time, however, the clashes were accompanied by a battleground along party lines. In the lead up to India’s 75th Independence Day, Mizoram, the only remaining non-Saffronised, Congress-backed state in the northeastern region of India, seemingly became a target for India’s ruling party, the BJP, and its project to establish politically motivated “peace.” The seven sister states in the northeastern part of India are well acquainted with sporadic bouts of violence along their borders. The dispute along the border between Assam and Mizoram centers around contentious claims about where the exact border lies. Mizoram claims 509 square miles of the inner-line reserve forest under an 1875 border demarcation, a claim Assam rejects based on a demarcation in 1933. In turn, this contentious space has long become a locus for the political aspirations of both regional and central ruling parties and powerful groups. Following the violent clashes in July 2021, news reports quoted villagers in Mizoram as describing the situation as “a war between two countries.” The optics were indeed strange: two police forces of the same country—albeit different states—engaged in a violent shootout against each other. 48 hours before the first clashes, India’s Home Minister Amit Shah had met with the Northeast Democratic Alliance (NEDA) to discuss the possibility of a border settlement. Over the next few weeks, the series of police firings that began in Kareemganj, Hailakandi, spread to the Cachar district of Assam. The renewed conflict has deeper roots: on a macroscopic level, contemporary political, cultural, and economic structures continue to bolster the active construction of enemies, within and without, for both the Assamese and the Mizo populations. What appears to be behind the violent clashes along the 165km-long fluid border—alarming in breadth and scope—in the region is a complex game of both ethnic identity politics as well as the central government’s agenda of putting an end to the Burmese supari or areca nut (often called betel nut) trade, an economy in which locals from both states are involved. The import of Burmese areca nut is now illegal in Mizoram , but continues to feature in vested economic and political interests that make up the fragile peace along the Assam-Mizo border. Assam has unresolved border disputes with all four of the largely tribal states that have been carved out of it since Independence. This past November, at the border with Meghalaya, the Assam Police killed six people . In each case many diverse communities in the hilly and forested northeastern region are imbricated, with many array of exports; in each case, the conflict is oversimplified in mainstream media narratives which ignore how identity and political economy become intertwined, and few point out the common charge placed on Assam: that much of its incursions occur without consent and punishment, and regularly trammel either already-codified or customary rights that communities have over their lands. Recently, much was made of an agreement between Assam and Mizoram in the form of a joint statement. While the statement by both the state governments to amicably resolve the matters of unrest along this border have reached the third round of talks, a high-level delegation from Mizoram expressed that "there has been huge unrest among the areca nut growers in Mizoram on account of problems being faced in the transportation of their produce to Assam and other parts of the country." The joint statement also seemed to flatten the nature of the conflict, simply stating that "economic activities such as cultivation and farming along the border areas would be allowed to continue regardless of the administrative control presently exercised by either state at such locations... subject to forest regulations and after informing the deputy commissioners concerned." The problem of the in-between in this region, however, cannot be mitigated with such generalities which highlight a kind of identity performance about border disputes that tie into political parties' agendas. This past December, the opposition in the Parliament of Assam staged a walkout , aggrieved about the perceived lack of action against Mizoram after a school in Cachar district of Assam was allegedly occupied by Mizo students. Meanwhile, the plight of local areca nut farmers goes generally unnoticed in Parliament. December 2022, six vehicles carrying areca nut into Mizoram were set ablaze , allegedly by Central Customs and Assam Rifles, which regularly prevent the export of areca nut from Mizoram and Tripura by seizing them at the border. Regardless of the party responsible, an areca nut growers' society in Mizoram, Hachhek Bial Kuhva Chingtu Pawl (HBKCP) argues that farmers are suffering because the Assam Police are unable (or unwilling) to verify if areca nuts from Mizoram are local or foreign. The Mizoram government too has come under fire for its laxity with smuggling, or care for farmers. Despite the entangled politicking and trade relations between Assam and Mizoram, however, there is a deeper history of the Mizo peoples being seen as the “other.” This has only intensified in recent years, as has the illicit trade of the areca nut. Whether borne out of an acute sense of cultural or political difference, the stereotypes that circulate in Assam deploy the Mizos’ native language, their Western convent education, or their land use, to construct notions of fundamental differences in identity. Who “they” refers to, however, as is often the case, is vague and context-dependent. The Assamese in general seem to mean the Mizos, but locals often mean politicians, police mean locals, and locals may also mean their wives, many of whom hail from villages across the border. In 2021, we visited the village of Lailapur, in the Cachar district of Assam, where residents had pelted stones at policemen from Mizoram who had previously clashed in 2020 with residents of Vairengte, a town in Mizoram’s own Kolasib district, exemplifying how any border is insufficient to explain the blurred nature of the conflict. Imtiaz Akhmed a.k.a. Ronju, was born and grew up in Lailapur. He is one of several truckers who ferry goods such as areca nut and black pepper between Assam and Mizoram (goods that are smuggled into India from Myanmar, Thailand, Malaysia, or Indonesia). He also has a Mizo wife, and claims that their son has the cutest mixture of the facial features of the two sister states, while simultaneously asserting that there are fundamental differences between the Assamese and Mizo peoples. A few locals of Lailapur who helped set up an electric pole for this shed/post of the Assam police officers wait for permission to go and have lunch at their homes on the other side of the police barricades, in Lailapur. Courtesy of Abhishek Basu. From Ronju’s perspective, the areca nut trade is at the core of the conflict on a local level: “What can we do if the betel nut is cheaper on that side? They [the Mizos and the Burmese] have been in this business for long enough to establish a monopoly. A kilo of betel nut sells for INR 128 there, while it's INR 300 here.” But despite the monopoly, working in Mizoram has its advantages for Ronju. “I have big connections with ministers [in Mizoram] who make life easier for me by way of permissions. I get supari here for the Assam State Police at times too! Currently, my truck, loaded with tatka [tight] Burmese supari, is waiting at the border because of the blockade. The Mizos themselves will help unload it on this side though,” he cackled. Ronju emphasizes difference, but his family and work hint at complex aspects of lived reality in towns along the border. Of course, the complexities are often cynically flattened by local political parties who rely on enflaming the conflict. Soon after the initial clashes last year, Assamese politicians and ministers arrived in Lailapur. The press, both local and national, flocked to them in front of a police barricade. The Organizational Secretary of the Assamese political party Veer Lachit Sena (VLS), Srinkhal Chaliha told the media, “We will not tolerate any threat. The Assamese people will give an appropriate reply!” Locals and groups most impacted by the clashes observed the spectacle. They crowded on both sides of the narrow highway that leads to Lailapur and ends at the Assam Police barricade, located 5 kilometres away from the actual border. Several witnesses shook their heads in disappointment over what they perceived to be the Assam government's cowardice: to many, not giving statements at the border itself, or not strongly condemning repeated acts of aggression from the Mizo side of the border—where many local civilians are believed to have been seen by the Assam State Police officers—seen equipped with light machine guns (LMGs) provided to them by alleged extremist groups backing the ruling Mizo National Front (MNF) government. It is important to note that Mizoram is the only state among the seven sister states of Northeast India that has yet to turn saffron, or be in alliance in any way whatsoever, with the right-wing BJP (despite short-lived alliances with the BJP and MNF part of the BJP-led coalition at the Centre, in Mizoram the party has historically allied itself with Congress ). The strong response expected from the Assamese government to counter repeated jibes from the Mizos, however, never materialized. Ronju, a local businessman, explained: "One call from the Mizo Church and MZP (Mizo Zirlai Pawl, a powerful student organization with a long and antagonistic history with the Centre and a shared relationship with the ruling MNF), and you will find village after Mizo village come together in solidarity, bearing arms like LMGs (lightweight machine guns) that too! There's nothing like that here in Assam. We're too divided." He added that he was proud of having driven through the perilous Mizo terrain all the way to Aizawl, the capital of Mizoram, several times. Ronju, who is a seemanto-bashi or a border resident, holds similar views as many of the locals standing along the highway leading to the barricades. They expect the Assamese government to take a strong stance in the face of perceived Mizo homogeneity and solidarity, as well as support from the Church. The juxtaposition of Mizo identity and Assamese nationalism is reflected in geographical landmarks along the border: the last Indian symbol on the Assamese side is a temple and on the Mizo side, a Church. Many locals on the Assamese side of the border as well as the second in command of the CRPF (Central Reserve Police Force, India's largest Central Armed Police Force) battalion posted in Fainum, Assam, talk about Mizos as if they were a warrior tribe. They believe that Mizos kill on a whim; accentuate their cultural differences, food preferences and eating habits; and speak Mizo instead of Hindi or English. Such sentiments strengthen the perception that there are fundamental differences between the two communities, despite their obvious closeness either in proximity, occupation, or familial ties. "They believe they are Mizos first. For them, the [Indian] nation is secondary. Someone needs to sit down and reason with them," says S. Debnath, Barak Valley resident and former member of the Forum for the Protection of Non-Mizos. Debnath believes Mizos feel like this because of particular state practices: “There's the case of the Inner Line Permit mandatory for anyone wishing to enter Mizoram, which makes them [the Mizos] feel like they have a sovereign right to their land. They allow the Burmese in when it comes to the business of Burmese supari, but not people like us who are from other states of India." Mizoram also enjoys other affordances that allow Mizos to take autonomous decisions, like the Inner Line Permit (ILP), which evidently frustrates the residents of the Hindu-majority Barak Valley of Assam. Debnath, like several others, does not consider metrics such as Mizoram's literacy rate, population size, and economic growth that are used to explain their sovereign status—most of which comes from tribal autonomy guaranteed over the Lushai Hills, provided for in Schedule Six of the Indian Constitution. Mizoram has one of the country's highest literacy rates. Its Oriental High School is among the first convent schools established by the British in Silchar, an economic hub in the contested Barak Valley of Assam. The school also has residential quarters for their mostly Mizo staff and teachers who form a large part of the closely-knit Mizo community in Assam. Since the Mizo Church is reluctant to involve itself in the local politics of the region, the staff and teachers at Oriental High School have been asked not to share their political opinions and to stay entirely professional. Rati Bora, another seemanto-bashi , has two sons who work on farms on either side of the border. Her son who works on the Mizo side earns more than his brother, presumably because Mizoram’s economy is one of the fastest growing in the country. On July 26, 2021, Rati Bora heard the shots fired by policemen on both sides of the border and feared for her life. Her sons begged her to evacuate. She left home with her family members and elderly parents and headed for her sister’s house in the neighboring town of Silchar. The incident was terrifying for border residents like Rati at that time. Now, however, the local tea shops opened by a few families dwelling right beside the police check post in Dholakhal are flourishing, she says. Rati Bora overlooking her patch of green, now taken by the CRPF to establish camps and diffuse tensions between the two states of Assam and Mizoram. Singhu, Assam, India. Courtesy of Abhishek Basu. We watched as four local boys from the Cachar district of Assam struggled to set up an electric pole. The pole would serve as a post for the state police that would be stationed there at night for a few weeks. Later as the boys crossed the police barricade to eat their lunch of bhaat (rice) at their homes, we watched as onlookers stared at them with suspicion. Young men from bordering villages must always keep their aadhar ID cards on themselves, and even guests visiting their homes must carry their identification documents. The performativity of nationalism takes on a certain intensity for residents of this region. Locals like Ronju and Rati are intimately familiar with this performance, and with an eye to the cross-border trade, tend to hold a more nuanced view of the changing economy of Silchar. “[Despite the suspicion and discrimination], at least now seemanto-bashis from Lailapur and Sighua villages are getting some recognition,” says Rati. “Previously girls wouldn't ever want to get married to boys from here, like my two sons. Now at least there's a chance. It's not so remote anymore… there are so many SUVs and Boleros zipping by,” she says, referring to the many politicians she had seen in her area. Taking us away from the blame game at play in this region is the plight of the injured policemen of the Assam State Police, a few still waiting for doctors to remove pellets shot from the handmade guns of Mizo locals. Stuck in a rut because of delayed discharge papers and an inaccessible, unresponsive healthcare system, the policemen have issued multiple statements on maintaining peace and order in the region that are very similar to those of their politicians. Some policemen wrap the pellets removed from their bodies in delicate tissue paper and keep them in their pockets as a token of pride. Some of them eagerly share videos they recorded on their smartphones or shared by villagers on the Mizo side of the border. Until a time comes when the region’s employment issues are solved instead of vague assurances that the help mandated by the Employment Guarantee Act; until a time comes when roads are developed, middlemen are erased, the indigenous industry is promoted excluding the existing large tea and oil businesses; until a time comes when Assam helps itself and not its vote-banks, it will not be able to hide behind the central government’s exclusionary tactics of us and them. Like the rest of India, the northeast too may well fall into the trap of not asking the right questions to those in power, especially at a time the Indian economy is reeling from the shortages of resources in the wake of the COVID-19 crisis. It comes down to the possibility of the Assamese being able to reclaim everything considered “illegal” about the Burmese areca nut trade. This involves cracking down on people like Ronju, their very own, who act like oil in these cracks. It is not enough to just roll the areca nut by placing it below your tongue, it is to recognize that cultures when living in proximity, obviously are bound to inform and resemble each other. We saw many a xorai or a casket-like plate in almost every Assamese household we went to, and were offered the traditional areca nut and paan, or betel nut palm. Such an act is a symbol of “welcoming outsiders,” they told us. This contrasts starkly with an occasion in one of our interviews with Debnath where he lowered the volume on the television upon hearing a TV anchor complaining about protests organized by Mizo student organizations against the draconian Indian Citizenship Act: the same legislation designed to kick out “outsiders” from Indian soil. For the Mizos, it is Bangladeshis who are the outsiders and indeed they often consider even the moniker of “Bangladeshi” disparaging. Meanwhile, for Debnath, it is the Mizos who are more of an “other,” more so than those who agree to live illegally in India. The dynamics between the Mizos, the Bangladeshis, the mainland Assamese, and the active construction of the “other” is at the heart of this story and the continuing clashes. To fully understand what’s going on at Lailapur, it is important to understand that this polarized strand of history is deeply etched in the memory of the Mizos of this generation. At the same time, it is undoubtedly true that there are two competing narratives—one told by the natives and the other by government officials. The first tells a tale of the oral ethnocultural history of the tribe linked to the land and forests: the narrative of many Mizos and organizations like the MZP. The second is the “official” history of state formation: the Assamese state narrative, if not that of India writ large. ∎ SUB-HEAD ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: Kareen Adam · Nazish Chunara A Dhivehi Artists Showcase Shebani Rao A Freelancer's Guide to Decision-Making No Man's Land: The disputed region near Singhua saw violent clashes between the forces of Mizoram and Assam leading to the death of 6 Assam policeman on duty on the 26th of July 2021 in Singua, Assam, India. Courtesy of Abhishek Basu. SHARE Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Reportage Assam-Mizoram Border Dispute Betel Nut Trade Northeast India Hachek Bial Kuhva Chingtu Pawl Areca Nut Northeast Democratic Alliance Amit Shah Sister States Nagaland Arunachal Pradesh Meghalaya Tripura Assam Rifles Mizoram Assam Cachar District Myanmar Burma Black Pepper Lailapur Nationalism BJP Inner Line Permit Silchar Veer Lachit Sena Ethnically Divided Politics Political Agendas Political Parties Mizo Zirlai Pawl VLS Mizo National Front Mizo English as Class Signifier Convent Education CPRF Central Reserve Police Force Forum for the Protection of Non-Mizos Seemanto-bashi Employment Guarantee Act Mizo student organizations Indian Citizenship Act Performative Nationalism Manipur JOYONA MEDHI is currently working as an Academic Associate in IIMC, New Delhi, India. With a background in media sociology, she looks for every opportunity to go long-form especially with her writing, interviewing and research. She's also conducted in-depth interviews along the Indo-Bangladesh border as a Direction Associate for the documentary Borderlands . For her proposed PhD project. She's looking to develop a more sensitive and nuanced language around the way we see photographs, photographers and the photographic process today. Her reportage and writings on art have been published in magazines like The Firstpost, Quint, Smashboard, Zenger News, Burn Magazine and Art and Deal . ABHISHEK BASU , originally from Tatanagar in Jharkhand, is a freelance art/documentary photographer, who works for various publishing houses on experimental story telling techniques, book design, curation and multimedia. His quarterly tabloid initiative, Provoke Papers , focuses on migration and labour relations. It takes root in a series titled How green was my mountain, which is his 4-year-long documentation of the coal mines of Jharkhand's Jharia district, 60 kms. from his hometown. Taking to Abbas’s advice, “buy a pair of shoes and fall in love with it”, Abhishek’s subjects span the wide variety of where life and his understanding of it have taken him. If there had to be a universal thread/subtext to his works it would be his exploration of the starkness of the human condition attempting to make you see it for what it is. His work has been published in magazines like Himal Southasian, The Wire, Burn Magazine, The Firstpost and Quint . 25 Feb 2023 Reportage Assam-Mizoram 25th Feb 2023 LIFE ON LINE Umar Altaf 27th Jul Crossing Lines of Connection Arshad Ahmed · Chanchinmawia 14th Oct Tawang's Blessing Pills Bikash K. Bhattacharya 7th Jun Chokepoint Manipur Makepeace Sitlhou 3rd Oct Disappearing Act Anonymous 2nd Apr On That Note:

· INTERACTIVE Event · Panel FLUX · Jaya Rajamani & Bhavik Lathia on the US Left & Media The current mood on the US left is one of extreme pessimism, particularly in the wake of movement dissipation after the end of the Bernie Sanders primary campaign. Such a moment requires reckoning with movement mistakes, thinking about the necessity of leftist media, and possibly even a self-identification with our most doomer selves. Watch the event in full on IGTV. FLUX: An Evening in Dissent FLUX was held at a depressing moment for media workers on the left: all "doomers", as Jaya Rajamani referred to herself at the time. Despite the Democrats winning the White House, dispiriting cabinet appointments by to-be President Biden, especially in the wake of the loss of Bernie Sanders' primary campaign left a sense of a weak Left with the dissipation of progressive movement energy by the end of 2020. Non-Fiction Editor Tisya Mavuram convened with writers, activists, and organizers Bhavik Lathia and Jaya Rajamani to discuss how to rebuild power, the Left's relationship to media, how centrists managed to defeat a historic challenge in the form of Sanders' campaign, and a reckoning with mistakes made. Tarfia Faizullah: Poetry Reading Jaishri Abichandani's Art Studio Tour Natasha Noorani's Live Performance of "Choro" Nikil Saval & Kshama Sawant: On Movement Politics at the Local & Municipal Level, COVID-19 & the Two-Party Structure Rajiv Mohabir: Poetry Reading SAAG, So Far: A Panel with the Editors DJ Kiran: A Celebratory Set SUB-HEAD Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Event Panel Bernie Sanders Progressive Politics Democratic Socialism Democratic Socialists of America DSA Digital Advocacy Digital Space Funny Twitter Accounts Optimism on the Local Level Joe Biden Wisconsin Wisconsin Democrats Municipal Politics State Senate United States Progressivism Black Solidarities Demographics Populism Progressive Populism Inevitability Doomers Wisconsin as an Electoral Knife's Edge White Supremacy Fascism Republican Vote The History of the Right-Wing Trump's Base Errors in the Bernie Sanders Campaign Woke Politics Coalition Building Media Growth of Left Media Leftist Media Twitch Podcasts Liberals Breitbart Billionaire-Funded Media Messaging Status Quo FLUX Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. 5th Dec 2020 AUTHOR · AUTHOR Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. 1 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 On That Note:

ART HISTORIAN Partha Mitter PARTHA MITTER is an Emeritus Professor at Sussex University, a Member at Wolfson College, Oxford, and an Honorary Fellow at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. He’s held fellowships from Churchill College and Clare Hall, Cambridge, the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton, the Getty Research Institute, and others. He was a Radhakrishnan Memorial Lecturer at All Souls College, Oxford. His books include Much Maligned Monsters: History of European Reactions to Indian Art, The Triumph of Modernism: India’s Artists and the Avant-Garde 1922-1947, and others. He works with the Bauhaus Foundation in Berlin and Dessau. ART HISTORIAN WEBSITE INSTAGRAM TWITTER Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 LOAD MORE

AUTHOR Chanchinmawia CHANCHINMAWLA is a journalist based in an Indo-Myanmar border town in India's Mizoram. He has previously contributed to Al Jazeera , Reuters , etc. AUTHOR WEBSITE INSTAGRAM TWITTER Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 LOAD MORE

· THE VERTICAL Letter · Balochistan Letter to History (II) In this letter, Ustad Mohammad Ali Talpur responds to Hazaran Baloch, tracing the moral and political stakes of remembrance and resistance in the Baloch struggle. He foregrounds the legacy of the Baloch nation, where mourning and honoring martyrs binds generations, and encourages his pupil to trust in the unflinching nature and will of the Baloch people—traits that have triumphed in the face of 77 years of injustice. Iman Iftikhar Talpur Sahab (2025) Digital Illustration My Dearest Daughter, Hazaran, Your anguished letter made me cry tears of rage, anger, and sadness. They cut deeper into the scars that remain on my soul after witnessing the suffering of our people for over half a century. Having lost so many of my friends and former students, I wonder if these wounds will ever heal. I remember Lawang Khan , seventy years old, who died defending his village in 1973. I remember Ali Mohammad Mengal , a veteran from 1960. I remember Safar Khan Zarakzai who, when surrounded and asked to surrender, replied: This is my land; I will defend it with my life. He died fighting. Etched on my soul are the enforced disappearances of my dearest friends, Duleep Dass “Dali” and Sher Ali Marri, in the spring of 1976. Dali nursed me back to health when I lay injured in the mountains. Etched, too, is the suffering of Baloch families I witnessed living as refugees in Afghanistan—only to be identified as terrorists upon their return. So many unsung heroes, so many disappeared without a trace, so many lives uprooted. They found no peace, neither in exile, nor upon return. My spiritual association with the Baloch struggle began on 15 July 1960, when Nawab Nauroz Khan’s son, Batay Khan, along with six companions––Sabzal Khan Zehri, Bahawal Khan Musiyani, Wali Muhammad Zarakzai, Ghulam Rasool Nichari, Masti Khan Musiyani, and Jamal Khan Zehri—were executed after the state broke its promise of amnesty. Four were hanged in Hyderabad Jail. Three, including Batay Khan, in Sukkur Jail. It was my uncle, Mir Rasool Bakhsh Talpur, who claimed their bodies, performed the funeral rites, and brought them to Kalat. On 21 October 1971, I left home and joined the armed struggle in the Marri hills. I was fuelled by rage. You ask what bullets sound like when they tear through our bodies. I thought of the twenty-seven fired into Sangat Sana , the three that pierced Jalil Reki ’s heart, the one that struck Ali Sher Kurd ’s forehead. Those martyrs may not have heard them, but those sounds echo in the soul of every Baloch who loves the motherland. You mention the screeching chains as they dragged my precious Mahrang away, shamelessly calling it arrest; her sarri/سری/chador trampled by those abducting her. You ask me about the thunder that must have shaken the heavens when my dearest Sammi’s سری was snatched from her head to dehumanize and humiliate her. All this and more is forever seared into me. Let me tell you what a sarri means to the Baloch. Fights cease when our women, with sarris in hand, come in-between. The Baloch say: the sarri is sacred. Our poet Atta Shad said that in return for a bowl of water, we give a hundred years of loyalty. I wish he had also said that the desecration of the sarri is never forgiven. Not in a thousand generations. It was difficult when I first joined the struggle. Despite the pain, however, there was also the belief that eventual victory would come. I, too, closed the door of hopelessness because I knew we were sowing seeds that would one day grow into trees—providing shade and fruit to all. When Banuk Karima was taken from us, it left the nation mourning. Her death created a void which seemed impossible to fill. Then came Mahrang, Sammi, Sabiha, Beebow, and hundreds more. Karima lit a fire in the hearts of Baloch women to participate in the national struggle––she embodied the wisdom and courage I see in all of you. When asked what Banuk Karima meant to Balochistan and its struggle, I replied: Karima is the conscience and the consciousness of the Baloch Nation . You ask me about little Kambar, Zahid’s son, who has lost another father this cursed March. I cannot send him words of consolation; they would be meaningless. But I want him to know that this isn’t his injustice to bear alone. The Baloch Nation will remember. You ask me about the state’s inhumanity toward Bebarg, who lives his life as a paraplegic. Why does the state fear a person who is unable to walk? It fears his voice. That is how the state maintains control: by repressing Baloch voices. My dearest child, it is of utmost importance to understand the essence of this state. It is by nature predatory and extractive––it cannot expand without exploiting us and our words, which refuse to submit to its evil design. We should not expect humanity or compassion from political parties integral to the establishment. They work for each other and protect their own interests. All pillars of the state are complicit. And in general, the silence of society is deafening too. The state will continue repressing us. What we do in response is our responsibility. Our only avenue is resistance. If we give it up, repression will be manifold, as docile people are an easier target. You rightly stated that Mahrang and Sammi taught the Baloch that they must stop being forever mourners, forever betrayed—and for that, they are considered the greatest threat and have been jailed. You are rightly worried about the fact that the new voices of our movement are now in jail cells, and that the state is trying to terrify young girls from treading the path that Karima, Mahrang, and Sammi chose. I feel it is important to understand how our Baloch Nation has responded to this unending crisis. Today, on the streets of Balochistan, girls—some as young as five years old—are carrying pictures of Karima, Mahrang, and Sammi. They are not merely holding their images; they picture themselves as these icons, and that is where our hope lies. For tomorrow, there will be Karimas, Mahrangs, Sammis, Sabihas, and Beebows in the millions. No power on earth will be able to stop them. I am not waiting for that tomorrow—it has already begun. The bastions of tyranny are crumbling, and that is why repression has multiplied and spread. That is why Mahrang and Sammi have been imprisoned. And while this violence will continue, it cannot subdue our spirits. “ Pakistan Zindabad ” was knifed onto the bodies of those Baloch who were extrajudicially killed. Their eyes gouged, their bodies drilled. Did the resistance vaporize and vanish? No. During the 2013 Long March by Mama Qadeer Baloch, Farzana Majeed, and others, faces were covered to avoid recognition. Today, thousands come out fearlessly to protest. The Baloch Nation has become fearless. The only history with a limited shelf life is that of the oppressor. Our history is ineradicable and can only flourish—for victory is our destiny. You ask if writing is futile. No, my dearest daughter, writing is our weapon. And it is a weapon that terrifies the oppressor because the word of freedom is sacred—it enlightens and motivates. Why do they seize books Baloch put up at book fairs? Writing challenges their phony and misleading discourse. Keep writing. You are empowering the Baloch narrative and preserving the history of Baloch resistance—a history long subjected to suppression. Writing strikes fear into the hearts and minds of oppressors in a way that no other weapon can. While other weapons bring only death and destruction, writing gives life—and that is why they fear words so deeply. Future generations will thank you and honor you for your words. You also ask, “Who will stand with us?’ and “Is it possible that the other oppressed nations of this land will stand with us in defiance of a shared oppressor?” My respected daughter, I believe that unity arises from two sources: either from the pain people share, or from a collective consciousness shaped by shared aspirations, history, and naturally, pain. Expecting support from those who believe in the narratives taught in Pakistan Studies is futile. And yes, do not expect the world to come to our aid—it has allowed Israel to do whatever it pleases to the Palestinians. The people may raise their voices, but governments will remain silent—because speaking up would endanger the very systems of brutality and exploitation they rely on. Merely being oppressed does not automatically give someone the consciousness to feel the pain of others or to support them. There are millions of oppressed people here, but support cannot be expected from them in the same way it can be from those who share our collective pain. To obstruct the path of collective consciousness, the state abducts students, blocks book fairs, and systematically neglects the education sector—ensuring that not many Baloch become educated. This denial of education is a key part of a calculated policy of erasure. Through their indiscriminate repression, however, they are unknowingly forging our collective consciousness. This will be the very reason for their downfall. You have talked about our mourning and grief over the years and how it continues. Yes, when there is death, there is grief and mourning—but it has not only been that. When my dearest friend Raza Jehangir was killed on 14 August 2013 by the state, we honored his death. His brave mother led the funeral and they sang a lullaby: Raza jan is little (child) and innocent, joyfully asleep in the decorated cradle. Joyfully asleep in the decorated cradle, sapient (learned men) are his forefathers. Then there is the incredible picture of the wife of Banzay Pirdadani Marri, who stands at the graves of her two sons, Mohammad Khan and Mohammad Nabi, draped in the flag that symbolizes a free Balochistan. They were killed on the same day and their bodies thrown on the roadside. I treated the two boys once, when they were very young and sick. When they grew up, I taught them at the school I managed for our refugee children in Lashkar Gah, Afghanistan. How could my soul feel peace after their death? Yet I know that despite the depth of pain caused by the loss and disappearance of loved ones, the Baloch have mourned with grace and dignity. They cannot be accused of selling their grief. Those in power have offered compensation to the families of the disappeared, but these offers have always been firmly rejected. In the end, you ask, “Tell me, Baba Jan, are we destined to be forever caught in this storm, forever erased, forever replaced?” This storm—or the ones that came before—could not erase us, nor replace us, and neither will the ones that may come in the future. Why do I say this? Because the storm that came on 27 March 1948 could not erase us. Then came another in October 1958 , which led to the resistance of Nawab Nauroz Khan. He was promised amnesty on the oath of the Quran, yet on a single day—15 July 1960—six of his companions and one of his sons were hanged. Some believed it was the end of the resistance. But did it end? No. Babu Sher Mohammad Marri and Ali Mohammad Mengal stood their ground and kept the resistance alive. Peace was made in 1970, but provocations remained. So emerged the 1973–1977 insurgency to resist repression. In September 1974 , when some Marris in Chamaling surrendered under assault by gunships, the state claimed that the core of the resistance had been broken. But had it? No—because the fighting continued until 1977. That was not the end. The Marris who took refuge in Afghanistan did not return when the Zia regime offered them amnesty . Despite the hardships of life as refugees, they stayed. Khair Bakhsh Marri joined them in 1982. He remained there for nearly a decade. That act of defiance kept the spirit of the resistance alive back home. A period of apparent dormancy followed, from 1993 to 2000. But beneath the surface, resentment simmered and political awareness grew. Matters came to a head when Khair Bakhsh Marri was arrested on fabricated charges in 2000 and kept in jail for two years. That moment reignited the resistance. Then came a turning point: the killing of Akbar Bugti on 26 August 2006. Like the 1973–1977 insurgency, the fight spread across Balochistan—it has not ended. Since 2000, the Baloch have faced the severest repression. Every brutal tool at the state's disposal has been used. Our academics, such as Saba Dashtyari and Zahid Askani , have been killed; our political activists have been murdered or disappeared; our journalists have been silenced; our poets have been targeted; and our students have been abducted. And now, even our women have been incarcerated. Yet, the resistance lives on—it refuses to die. It survives because it is an expression of the people's most cherished dream. The Baloch are a resilient nation and do not give up what they hold dear—and what they hold dearest are dignity and freedom. It is no coincidence that the Baloch call their motherland Gul Zameen—Land of Flowers. As they say, Waye watan hushkain dar —I love my land even if it is like a withered twig. There is something vital that must be said. Something that has long been the bane of the Baloch Nation. Those soul-selling Baloch who have collaborated with the establishment, aiding in the suppression of Baloch rights and enabling crimes against their own people. There is an indigenous Native American fable: the birds complained of being killed by arrows, and the response was, “Were it not for the feathers of birds in the arrows, you would be safe.” Our suffering, too, would have been less had some Baloch not provided the feathers for those arrows. Let me tell you something: if brutal crackdowns and military operations could suppress a people's desire for national, political, social, and economic rights, then Algeria would still be a French colony. The French were ruthless and unforgiving. They picked people up, held them in custody, and tortured them for as long as they pleased. Yet in the end, they had to pack up and leave. The resistance, and the will of the people, could not be broken. It is said the French “won” the Battle of Algiers in 1957 by crushing the FLN in the city, but they lost the war in 1960 when the Algerian people rose up together, showing the futility of repression. Repression eventually breeds fearlessness. It compels people to abandon concern for their own safety. And here, they haven’t even won the Battle of Quetta—yet they have already lost Balochistan by irreversibly alienating the Baloch Nation. We can—and must—learn from the Palestinians, who, like us, have endured physical, economic, cultural, and geographic assaults—a systematic genocide since 1948. Yet they have never surrendered. Especially in Gaza, where since October 2023 , genocide has reached a brutal peak. Gaza has been flattened. Hospitals bombed, medical staff killed, famine imposed through a blockade of food and water. Over 60,000 people—seventy percent of them women and children—have been killed . And yet, the people of Gaza have not broken. Gaza may be a narrow strip of land, but despite the backing of powerful Western nations, Israel has failed to crush the spirit of the Gazans. Balochistan is vast. If Gaza has not been broken, then neither can we. In the end, my very precious child, I will say this: Tum maroge, hum niklenge —you will kill us, we will rise. This is not an empty phrase. It is how the Baloch have faced oppression for generations. If it were hollow, the resistance would not have persisted and grown stronger over the past seventy-seven years. It is true that a terrible price has been paid—in blood, in tears, in lost generations. But it is also the reason we have survived. We endure as a dignified nation, seeking a life of freedom and honor, and our will to resist not only endures—it flourishes. Today, I see you all protesting against state oppression, as bravely and wisely as Karima did, and I know this is why hopelessness is not an option for us. Hope is the fruit of the seeds Banuk Karima and other Baloch revolutionaries sowed in the soil of Balochistan. And so, with the accumulation of grief in adulthood, we also inherit seventy-seven years of the history of Baloch resistance, which, in spite of its traumatic chapters, is an inheritance of revolutionary hope for a free Balochistan. Mir Mohammad Ali Talpur Hyderabad 5 April 2025 ∎ SUB-HEAD Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Letter Balochistan Pakistan Activism Enforced Disappearances State Violence Protests Liberation Journalism Revolution Martyr Grief Sammi Deen Baloch Mahrang Baloch Resistance History Violence Writing After Loss Dissidence Disappearance Baloch Yakjehti Committee Dr Mahrang Baloch Arrests Tum Marogy Hum Niklengy Militarism Leadership Mass Graves Assassination Imprisonment Armed Struggle Repression State Repression Oppression Defiance Mir Mohammad Ali Talpur Sarri Sacred Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. 9th Apr 2025 AUTHOR · AUTHOR Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. 1 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 On That Note:

ARTIST OCTO OCTO is a self-taught Malaysian artist from Mentakab, Pahang, whose multidisciplinary work focuses on the violent politics of the Malaysian state, creatively engaging his practice in themes of police brutality, statelessness, and urban poverty. His art has been featured in Amnesty International's We Make Our World exhibition and Patani Art Space's Kenduri Seni Patani exhibition. ARTIST WEBSITE INSTAGRAM TWITTER Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 LOAD MORE

“We're not post-colonial. We're post-colonized...Even if purportedly colonialism ended, it didn't end for the languages we speak, for the passports we hold, for the laws that govern our lives. To claim post-coloniality is a mirage.” COMMUNITY Inventing South Asia “We're not post-colonial. We're post-colonized...Even if purportedly colonialism ended, it didn't end for the languages we speak, for the passports we hold, for the laws that govern our lives. To claim post-coloniality is a mirage.” VOL. 1 INTERVIEW AUTHOR AUTHOR AUTHOR Watch the interview on YouTube or IGTV. ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: AUTHOR Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 AUTHOR Heading 5 Watch the interview on YouTube or IGTV. SHARE Facebook ↗ Twitter ↗ LinkedIn ↗ Interview Karachi 2nd Sep 2020 Interview Karachi The Loss of Hindustan Intellectual History South Asia as a Term Experimental Methods Language Postcolonialism Karachi University Chachnama KK Aziz Michel-Rolph Trouillot Nationalism Postcolonialism as Myth South Asian Studies Columbia University Partition Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. We're not post-colonial. We're post-colonized...Even if purportedly colonialism ended, it didn't end for the languages we speak, for the passports we hold, for the laws that govern our lives. To claim post-coloniality is a mirage. RECOMMENDED: The Loss of Hindustan: The Invention of India by Manan Ahmed Asif (Harvard University Press, 2020). More Fiction & Poetry: Date Authors Heading 5 Date Authors Heading 5 Date Authors Heading 5 Date Authors Heading 5 Date Authors Heading 5 Date Authors Heading 5

Zara’s poem moves through the swagger, danger, and bruised glamour of urban Pakistan to show that being both woman and legend can make you a spectacle, a liability, and a survivor all at once. · BOOKS & ARTS Poetry · Lahore Zara’s poem moves through the swagger, danger, and bruised glamour of urban Pakistan to show that being both woman and legend can make you a spectacle, a liability, and a survivor all at once. Untitled (2025), digital illustration, courtesy of Mahnoor Azeem. To be Woman and Hip in Dunya I learned how to be hip from girls who sat at dhabas – It was 2018; I was nothing and no one, And shudh desi leftism was still a dream the kids had. I waded through the decay of urban Pakistan - The waterless boat basin - In my white platform boots. I was not the only girl who figured out life so. This is the manifesto of hip woman Who ate the apple, and risked jihad Baadalon se giri, bijli ki tarhan Bazaar-e-aam main — afwah uthi Ye kesi mystical saazish hai! Issey dewaar main chunwa diya jaye Jahanpana! Shehenshah: My only weapon is my poetry. When your soldiers visit the marketplace Encroachment notice and batons in hand I see them at the gate, While in the midst of my dance — I am not a dancer so I entertain children. Meanwhile, jesters, poets, and ustads Grace the King’s colony! For my own safety, I am not invited. Hip woman is: She’s got the law cowered Her gait relaxed, magnificent night suit chic Fists up, she raises a new independence slogan: Yeh jo dehshatgardi hai, Isske peeche wardi hai. How everything is metaphor! Last Friday, when I dressed up as girl I bruised myself to win a race Now, it hurts to be teased and caressed Waisay masoom banti hun magar pata hai mujhey — Hot boys are dangerous to me This is not the first time I have hurt myself so. To be woman and hip: Is to be okay not being woman at all, To be unafraid of androgyny Allow yourself all the ugly of humanity I am maila like my city. Meri shalwar key paainchon per Meri mitti ka daagh hai: The beggar’s pleading, My daddy’s corruption Let the truth slap the princess out of me For to not be woman and hip Is to be dream deferred, girl interrupted. Aik naya pollution metric propose karti hun: Khwabon ki kirchian kitnay gigaton carbon emit karti hain? When they make a liar out of a girl, I want you to kill me as tribute. SUB-HEAD Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Poetry Lahore Karachi Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. 24th Oct 2025 AUTHOR · AUTHOR Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. 1 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 6 On That Note:

Join us in Colombo, Lahore, New York, Bombay, London, Houston, Los Angeles, Lucknow, and many more cities across the globe. Events Join our team for events across the globe, and subscribe to our newsletter to stay informed about events. UPCOMING London Lucknow MAY Burlington New York Los Angeles New York Colombo NOVEMBER Islamabad SEPTEMBER Lahore Washington DC Manhattan Brooklyn AUGUST Los Angeles APRIL OCTOBER MARCH Brooklyn

“When I say that language has failed us, I mean that there is no amount of information you can give a society that necessarily means it will be compelled to act.” COMMUNITY On the Relationship between Form & Resistance “When I say that language has failed us, I mean that there is no amount of information you can give a society that necessarily means it will be compelled to act.” Iman Iftikhar · Sharmin Hossain · Kalpana Raina · Maira Khwaja · Suneil Sanzgiri The second panel from our event on 30th March 2024, "Solidarity: Beyond the Disaster-Verse," at ShapeShifter Lab in Brooklyn, New York, which marked the close of Volume 2 Issue 1 of SAAG. Here, Iman Iftikhar, Sharmin Hossain, Maira Khwaja, Kalpana Raina, and Suneil Sanzigir discuss how the varied forms of storytelling they use inform and are informed by their politics, resistance, and solidarity and how they feel it is most useful. This panel picks up from where Panel 1, "What do we mean when we talk about Solidarity?" ends. What follows is a discussion of form & storytelling with: Iman Iftikhar, a researcher, educator, co-founder and manager of Kitab Ghar, an Associate Editor at SAAG, and an editor at Folio Books. Maira Khwaja, a journalist, multimedia producer, and researcher at the Invisible Institute . She is also an Associate Producer of We Grown Now dir. Minhal Baig, April 2024, Stage 6 Films & Sony Pictures Classics. Kalpana Raina, a co-translator of For Now, It is Night: Stories by Hari Krishna Kaul (Archipelago Books, February 2024) Sharmin Hossain, an abolitionist organizer, artist, and the Organizing Director at 18 Million Rising that organizes Asian Americans. Suneil Sanzgiri, a filmmaker, researcher, artist, whose first solo exhibition, Here the Earth Grows Gold , opened at the Brooklyn Museum in October 2023. Photographs courtesy of Josh Steinbauer. SOLIDARITY: BEYOND THE DISASTER-VERSE Panel 1: What do we mean when we talk about Solidarity? SOLIDARITY: BEYOND THE DISASTER-VERSE Quintet Performance The second panel from our event on 30th March 2024, "Solidarity: Beyond the Disaster-Verse," at ShapeShifter Lab in Brooklyn, New York, which marked the close of Volume 2 Issue 1 of SAAG. Here, Iman Iftikhar, Sharmin Hossain, Maira Khwaja, Kalpana Raina, and Suneil Sanzigir discuss how the varied forms of storytelling they use inform and are informed by their politics, resistance, and solidarity and how they feel it is most useful. This panel picks up from where Panel 1, "What do we mean when we talk about Solidarity?" ends. What follows is a discussion of form & storytelling with: Iman Iftikhar, a researcher, educator, co-founder and manager of Kitab Ghar, an Associate Editor at SAAG, and an editor at Folio Books. Maira Khwaja, a journalist, multimedia producer, and researcher at the Invisible Institute . She is also an Associate Producer of We Grown Now dir. Minhal Baig, April 2024, Stage 6 Films & Sony Pictures Classics. Kalpana Raina, a co-translator of For Now, It is Night: Stories by Hari Krishna Kaul (Archipelago Books, February 2024) Sharmin Hossain, an abolitionist organizer, artist, and the Organizing Director at 18 Million Rising that organizes Asian Americans. Suneil Sanzgiri, a filmmaker, researcher, artist, whose first solo exhibition, Here the Earth Grows Gold , opened at the Brooklyn Museum in October 2023. Photographs courtesy of Josh Steinbauer. SOLIDARITY: BEYOND THE DISASTER-VERSE Panel 1: What do we mean when we talk about Solidarity? SOLIDARITY: BEYOND THE DISASTER-VERSE Quintet Performance SUB-HEAD ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: Kareen Adam · Nazish Chunara A Dhivehi Artists Showcase Shebani Rao A Freelancer's Guide to Decision-Making Panel 2 of the event "Solidarity: Beyond the Disaster-Verse" held on 30th March 2024. SHARE Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Panel Language Solidarity Films Film-Making Capital Investigative Journalism Criminal Justice Abolitionism Solidarity: Across the Disaster-Verse Prisons Police Personal History The Petty Self Kashmiri Struggle Translation India Anti-Colonialism Two Refusals Goa Hybrid Multimedia Sham-e-Ali Nayeem Portuguese Nationalism Afro-Asianism Bandung Conference Angola Mozambique Sita Valles Portuguese Communist Party Movimento Popular de Libertação de Angola Angolan Liberation Youth/Police Project Act of Listening Stop and Frisk IMAN IFTIKHAR is a political theorist, historian, and amateur oil painter and illustrator. She is an editor for Folio Books and a returning fellow at Kitab Ghar Lahore. She is based in Oxford and Lahore. SHARMIN HOSSAIN is a Bangladeshi-American queer Muslim organizer and artist, from Queens, New York. She is the Organizing Director at 18 Million Rising , building national Asian American political power that contributes to movements for racial justice, abolition, anti-militarism, and democracy through political education, and deep base building. She was the Campaign Director of the Liberate Abortion Campaign, managing the coalition of more than 150 reproductive justice and rights organizations, groups, and abortion providers fighting for abortion access. KALPANA RAINA is a senior executive with extensive financial and management experience in the US and internationally. She serves on the boards of Information Services Group , and Words Without Borders. Her collaborative translation project of stories from the Kashmiri language, For Now, It Is Night, was published in Winter 2023 by Harper Collins in India and Spring 2024 by Archipelago Press in the United States. MAIRA KHWAJA is an educator and multimedia producer. She is the director of public strategy at the Invisible Institute . Her work centers on the Youth / Police Project , where she works with young people most affected by policing in the South Side to shape new discussions and efforts around public safety. She was a 2021 Leaders for a New Chicago award winner. She worked as an associate producer on We Grown Now (dir. Minhal Baig), a film about children in now-demolished high-rise public housing. Her work has been published in the South Side Weekly , The Funambulist , and The New York Times . SUNEIL SANZGIRI is an artist, researcher, and filmmaker. Spanning experimental video and film, animations, essays, and installations, his work contends with questions of identity, heritage, culture, and diaspora in relation to structural violence and anticolonial struggles across the Global South. His first institutional solo exhibition Here the Earth Grows Gold opened at the Brooklyn Museum in October 2023. His films have circulated at film festivals and institutions globally, including at the International Film Festival Rotterdam, New York Film Festival, Hong Kong International Film Festival, Criterion Collection, among others. 17 Apr 2024 Panel Language 17th Apr 2024 JOSH STEINBAUER is an award-winning filmmaker, musical composer, and visual artist. His work has been shown in Heaven, Third Ward, No Moon, Gen Art, H. Lewis galleries, Harvard Art Museum and American Folk Art Museum , and published in Nowhere Magazine, Terrain, The Offing, Moving Poems, Scroll.in, BrooklynOnDemand , and the Times of India, amongst others. Some of his portrait drawings are currently exhibited at the Long Island City Artists' (LIC-A) newest show Drawing Beyond the Surface , curated by Jorge Posada. Ten Rupee Note Ria Modak 17th Feb The Cost of Risk in Bombay’s Film Industry Nihira 5th Aug What Does Solidarity Mean? Azad Essa · Heba Gowayed · Tehila Sasson · Suchitra Vijayan 8th Apr Dissident Kid Lit Saira Mir · Shelly Anand · Vashti Harrison · Simran Jeet Singh 20th Dec Two Stories Nabarun Bhattacharya 6th Oct On That Note: