Photojournalist NayanTara Gurung Kakshapati in conversation with Shubhanga Pandey COMMUNITY Photo Kathmandu & Public History in Nepal NayanTara Gurung Kakshapati Photojournalist NayanTara Gurung Kakshapati in conversation with Shubhanga Pandey The archive of Nepal Picture Library is there to diversity our narratives of the past and begin to look at historically marginalized histories of specific communities, whether that be along the lines of caste or ethnicity or gender. 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 Nepal Archiving Photojournalism Photo Circle Photo Kathmandu International Festival Nepal Picture Library Library Archival Practice Exhibitions Pedagogy People's Movement II Skin of Chitwan Indigeneity Indigenous Art Practice Indigeneous Spaces Dalit Histories Anthropocene Journalism Jana Andolan II Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) Insurgency Public History Public Space NayanTara Gurung Kakshapati lives in Kathmandu, Nepal and works at the intersections of visual storytelling, research, pedagogy, and collective action. In 2007, she co-founded photo.circle , an independent artist-led platform that facilitates learning, exhibition making, publishing, and a variety of other trans-disciplinary collaborative projects for Nepali visual practitioners. In 2011, she co-founded Nepal Picture Library , a digital archiving initiative that works towards diversifying Nepali socio-cultural and political history. She is also the co-founder and festival director of Photo Kathmandu , an international festival that takes place in Kathmandu every two years. She has served as festival director for South Asia’s premier non-fiction film festival Film Southasia , been part of the selection committee for the first cycle of World Press Photo ’s 6x6 Global Talent Program in Asia, and been a mentor for the 2020 World Press Photo Joop Swart Masterclass. She was recently awarded the 2020 Jane Lombard Fellowship by the Vera List Center for Art and Politics at The New School, New York. She studied documentary photography at the SALT Institute of Documentary Studies, Maine, and International Relations and Studio Art at Mt. Holyoke College, Massachusetts. Interview Nepal 25th Nov 2020 On That Note: Heading 5 23rd OCT Heading 5 23rd Oct Heading 5 23rd Oct

SAAG is a leftist literary magazine & an argument that South Asians have claimed avant-garde traditions since longer than the word was coined. MISSION South Asian Avant-Garde (SAAG) began as an argument that South Asians have claimed avant-garde traditions since before the word was coined. They experimented wildly in form, function, and craft; some enormously impacted “European” avant-gardism. After all, “South Asia” has rarely been the locus of those histories. (See: “Picasso manqué syndrome” ) How do we carve out such a leftist magazine in the contemporary media landscape when traditional media is shuttering and where literary magazines, art exhibits, and academic journals often exist as silos? By compensating both our immensely hard-working staff and contributors. By publishing work that is thoughtful, rigorous, and self-reflective about the global left: work that connects the local and the global, work that is unafraid but not provocative simply for the sake of it, and work that is internationalist in scope. By traipsing across genres and modes of art. Perhaps most critically, we carve out our space by eschewing the boundaries and binaries implied by the term “South Asia,” emphasizing syncretic connections and mellifluous exchanges of knowledge that do not foreclose intellectual thought to borders. SAAG exists to create a genuinely activist-literary space. It does not seek to preach to the choir or provide a drifting sense of “representation.” Rather, SAAG hopes to thicken “South Asian” intellectual thought through furious expansion and lively clash. Subscribe below to get the chance to become a member of SAAG early and get early access to our online store (under construction), discounts to a dizzying variety of new merch, including subscription boxes for books, zines, board games, archival art prints, our first print issue, access to events in cities across the globe, our entire archive, and active collaboration with the editorial team. We have a lot of exciting new places to go, grassroots organizations to partner with, and stories to tell. We’d love for you to join us in interrogating and shaping South Asian Avant-Garde Vol. 2. South Asian Avant-Garde is published by 501(c)(3) nonprofit South Asian Avant-Garde, Incorporated. SUBSCRIBE Success! DESIGN The design system for Volume 2 of SAAG is wildly different to that of Volume 1, for many reasons. Read more on the process and conceptual thinking underlying the changes in the design system here . Primary sans typeface: Neue Haas Grotesk by Monotype. Serif body text: Caslon Ionic & Antique No. 6 by Commercial Type. Display face, Issue 1: TT Ricks by TypeType Foundry. Our colophon (representing the collective above) is inspired by Rabindranath Tagore's painting Head Study . COLLECTIVE We are an unwieldy, globe-spanning collective (see: masthead ) of forty-six South Asian writers, editors, academics, organizers, translators, playwrights, journalists, visual artists and designers. We share a deep political commitment to radical art that says something new about power and inequality. CHANGES As crises deepen both in and around South Asia, we extend our mission to encompass other parts of the world. Part of our mission is to forge new communities and build upon long-running traditions of solidarity across oceans, languages, and nations. The Vertical is a column that includes essential stories from around the world, featuring voices that offer a more profound introduction to critical issues impacting regions not limited to South Asia. Our reorganized categories allow various forms of work to be presented in any category. The Vertical will publish timely op-eds and dispatches in any format, whether prose, comic, or photo essay. Read Issue 1 here . THE VERTICAL South Asian Avant-Garde is a digital literary magazine for global South Asian solidarities & activist approaches to representation. ∙MISSION ∙COLLECTIVE ∙CHANGES ∙DESIGN ∙RECENT ∙EVENTS About PAST EVENTS WASHINGTON D.C. 26th October 2024 DC Zine Fest 2024 Tabling with Art Director Priyanka Kumar and Anchovy Press, with original zines by SAAG. WATCH ↗ LAHORE 21st September 2024 Community Newsroom: Lahore With Kitab Ghar Lahore WATCH ↗ BROOKLYN 21 September 2024 Brooklyn Art Book Fair 2024 Contemporary Printmaking as a Technology of Dissent, with Abeer Hoque, Priyanka Kumar, and Vrinda Jagota WATCH ↗ ISLAMABAD 3rd August 2024 Launch Event Vol. 2 Issue 2 The City State: From Master Plan to Margins WATCH ↗ LOS ANGELES 1st June 2024 An Evening with Asha Puthli at Nor Black Nor White LA. Moderated by Vrinda Jagota. Feat.: Fariha Roisin, Raveena Aurora & Mriga WATCH ↗ LOS ANGELES 28th May 2024 Community Readings on Solidarity Small World Books, Venice, CA WATCH ↗ COLOMBO 7th May 2024 Launch Event at Barefoot Gallery Narratives of Solidarity: Avant-Garde Storytelling in Sri Lanka WATCH ↗ NEW HAVEN 30th April 2024 In conversation with Amit Chaudhuri Discussing NYRB reissues A Strange and Sublime Address, Afternoon Raag, & Freedom Song. WATCH ↗ BROOKLYN 30th March 2024 Launch Event Vol. 2 Issue 2 Solidarity: Across the Disaster-Verse · ShapeShifter Lab with panels, musical performances and more. WATCH ↗ NEW YORK 8th March 2024 Women, Resistance, Revolution. A SAAG & Kamli.NYC event · Panel with Gaiutra Bahadur, Gulalai Ismail & Suchitra Vijayan & musical performance by Apoorva Mudgal Ensemble. WATCH ↗ BROOKLYN 12th May 2023 Launch Event Vol. 2 Issue 1 Soapbox Gallery with album release of Apertures by Rajna Swaminathan, featuring Utsav Lal & Ganavya (Vagabonds Trio) WATCH ↗ NEW HAVEN 23rd April 2023 Film Screening JOYLAND (2023) dir. Saim Sadiq. Sponsored by the Asian-American Cultural Center, Yale Women's Center, and the Office of LGBTQ Resources. WATCH ↗ NEW YORK 22nd April 2023 In collaboration with SALAM for Rice & Resistance Tamil Labor on the Plantation WATCH ↗ LAHORE 31st December 2022 Launch Event at Kitab Ghar Literary Festival The Argument for an Internationalist Perspective of Disaster WATCH ↗ NEW YORK 22nd October 2022 In collaboration with SALAM for Rice & Resistance Climate Imperialism in Pakistan WATCH ↗ VIRTUAL 5th June 2021 In Grief, In Solidarity Panels, Films, Live Performances + more WATCH ↗ UPCOMING EVENTS MANHATTAN 9th November 2024 Grand Opening: Gul Gallery House of Gul & SAAG present Sat Chit Ananda: An Immersive Art Experience RSVP ↗ BURLINGTON 16th November 2024 Non-Fiction Comics Festival 2024 Come visit our table, with Priyanka Kumar and Anchovy Press, featuring original SAAG zines. Free to attend. ATTEND ↗ LONDON LUCKNOW Launch Events for Vol. 2 Issue 2 WATCH ↗

Since his electoral victory in 2014, Narendra Modi’s Hindutva brigade has attempted to render Muslims invisible through hypervisibility. Mob-lynchings "don’t just happen” to Muslims. Thook Jihad is to be expected. By applying microscopic, misinformative attention to Muslim businesses, homes, and livelihoods throughout the country, the BJP has forced Indian Muslims to constantly create hideouts for their humanity. However, as Modi’s monumental loss in the recent Lok Sabha polls indicates, Muslims refusing to accept the social and psychological invisibilization are already leading the charge for a brighter electoral future. · FEATURES Opinion · Madhya Pradesh Since his electoral victory in 2014, Narendra Modi’s Hindutva brigade has attempted to render Muslims invisible through hypervisibility. Mob-lynchings "don’t just happen” to Muslims. Thook Jihad is to be expected. By applying microscopic, misinformative attention to Muslim businesses, homes, and livelihoods throughout the country, the BJP has forced Indian Muslims to constantly create hideouts for their humanity. However, as Modi’s monumental loss in the recent Lok Sabha polls indicates, Muslims refusing to accept the social and psychological invisibilization are already leading the charge for a brighter electoral future. Saara Nahar Play (2023) Watercolour on Paper 22 x 30 inches Bulldozing Democracy When I was a child I was fascinated by the bulldozer that visited my street everyday and picked up trash from a nearby dumpyard. Bulldozers served as a good spectacle for us kids. We were intrigued by its ability to pick tonnes of trash in a matter of minutes. If you look up the term, “JCB ki khudai” (Bulldozer digging) on YouTube , you'll find dozens of innocuous videos with millions of views. In recent years, however, that imagery has changed. Today, these bulldozers produce the most horrid spectacle for kids and adults alike. Many Indian Muslims see the bulldozer as akin to an armoured tank, a tool of terror, seeking to uproot what holds their families together and stores their tangible memories and artefacts—their home. In recent years, the bulldozer has transformed from a harmless machine to a super villain serving extrajudicial punishment to its victims without trial. What stands in the way of its unrelenting arm is “enemy” territory, and the bulldozer shows no mercy. A few months ago, a dozen Muslim homes were bulldozed in Madhya Pradesh for allegedly storing beef, and men were jailed under the NSA (National Security Act) in what many Muslims widely perceived as vengeful action by the state government. In July , a Muslim man committed suicide after his home was demolished in an anti-encroachment drive in Lucknow city in Uttar Pradesh, in which hundreds of homes were demolished in a Muslim majority neighborhood. The Indian state suggested that displaced people buy alternative housing, similar to their statements on resettlements in 2015 . Other adjoining posh neighbourhoods were also meant to be demolished but were spared after an intervention by leaders of the ruling BJP and protests by the locals. In August, a sprawling 20,000 square feet bungalow—that belonged to Haji Shahzad Ali, a Muslim and former leader of the Congress party in MP—was bulldozed after he was accused of violence. A 2024 estimate by the Housing and Land Rights Network ( HLRN ) shows that government at the local, state, and federal levels demolished 153,820 homes in 2022 and 2023, resulting in the forcible eviction of more than 738,438 people from rural and urban areas across the country. Muslims were among the worst victims of these bulldozer drives. Illegal housing is a prominent issue in India. Ghettoisation, socioeconomic inequality, and mass migration to metropolitan cities like Delhi and Mumbai adds to the problem of illegal housing. News outlets have reported between 55,000 and 65,000 illegal housing developments in India between 2016 and 2024. The issue becomes uniquely problematic when homes of Muslims are selectively targeted and are considered a fight against “ Land Jihad. ” Every now and then, there's news of a major demolition drive against the so-called “illegal homes” belonging to Muslims. Similar to the Haji Shahzad Ali case, the demolition is alleged to happen as a response to crime. Later, however, the public is informed that the demolition and the crime are unrelated, although the way it plays out is as explicit revenge. The mainstream media hails it as quick justice, all while the underlying principles of natural justice are openly violated. In November 2024, the Supreme Court of India finally passed a strong verdict against these arbitrary bulldozer drives putting an end to the retributive demolition drives, but by now much damage has already been wrought. What about those who’ve already fallen victims to this “lawlessness?” After every forced demolition and eviction, I used to wonder where these people are meant to disappear off to? They can't bury themselves underground or dive into the sea, but we hardly hear of them once the dust of the bulldozer's destruction settles. As much as this violence instils fear, it can never successfully lead to the psychological and physical retreat of an entire community. This may make you wonder—what is the best way to invisibilize over 200 million people? Bulldozing is only a symptom of the malaise that plagues India today—a cog in the larger machinery of violence. You cannot press a big red button and expect them to immediately disappear for once and all. You can’t erase them through force and violence. So, what do you do then? A real life solution to this rather troubling rhetorical question has been developed by the Hindutva nationalist forces, who relentlessly target Muslims throughout India. All while, encouraging non-Muslim citizens to distance themselves from the Muslims for their own safety. Let me demonstrate this with a recent example of the insidious way in which, through hypervisibility and violence, Muslims are forced to disappear from public life. A recent 'directive’ in the state of Uttar Pradesh asked eateries that were situated along the path of a Hindu pilgrimage to display their names. A move intended to make the “Muslim” identities of the servers, cooks, and owners clear to the buyers and discourage commerce. It started after an anti-Muslim boycott was called by a far-right Hindutva cleric, who accused Muslims of mixing meat in vegetarian food and thook jiha d —a conspiracy that Muslims spit in the food of Hindus to wage a holy war. Despite the dehumanising, absurd, and defamatory nature of this message, the state did nothing to counter the request and instead mandated shopkeepers to prominently display their names on their shops. Consequently, many Muslims were forced to shut down their shops to avoid conflict, police harassment, and mob attacks. Many faced economic losses. Some were fired by their employers after allegedly being pressured by the police. It's important to note that Uttar Pradesh is opposed to Halal food certification, which is limited to the nature of food (vegetarian or non-vegetarian) and not the identity of the person cooking, serving, or selling it. The government knows that most things that are Halal for Muslims are permissible for Hindus as well, and nobody can stop Hindus from selling them. Here, however, the state was adamant that merely displaying the religious identity of vendors and cooks can ensure the purity of food and protect the religious rights of Hindu devotees. The process is simple. First, a campaign is initiated to make Muslims seem impure, unhygienic, and Thook jihadists. Naturally, Muslims are compelled to refute these false narratives. Due to the meat sales facing on and off bans, many Muslim businesses already suffer without any compensation. To rub salt in the wound, Muslims who run vegetarian eateries get accused of mixing meat in the food. Subsequently, a demand for segregation is imposed, and Muslim businesses are singled out, marked as targets by the state—by the very state that falsely claims to be against mixing the rules of food with the rules of religion. Where's the escape from all this? It's a heads-you-lose and tails-I-win dynamic. If you’re a Muslim, you can't cook meat on holy days for Hindus. If you do then you are probably mocking someone. If you don't, then you are conspiring to pollute vegetarians. You’ll be targeted either way. While the order has faced backlash, and has now been stayed by the Supreme court, it's not a one-off instance. In the last decade, we have witnessed this strategy play out in real time with the spread of an all pervasive vitriol that targets every aspect of Muslim life in India—from the God they pray to, to the clothes they wear, the food they eat, the language they speak, and now their homes, jobs, and families. What is supposed to be an innocuous and essential activity for others becomes a malicious conspiracy for Muslims. Undoubtedly, this humiliation has been sustained through violence and victim blaming. In one month since the election results were declared on June 4 , at least 12 Muslim men were brutally lynched across India. Perhaps, even most Muslims with no knowledge of English now know the meaning of the rather complex English word ‘lynching’. It's something that worries all of them and yet it has gradually become so mundane that it outrages only a few of them. After the recent wave of attacks, many Muslims questioned the silence of a now significantly stronger opposition party and even forced them to raise their voice in Parliament. For the opposition parties, however, this silence was a matter of convenience. In the past, they sought Muslim votes by acknowledging the threat of Hindutva, but continued to do nothing. They gaslit Muslims into not saying a word. For their voices to be heard, Muslims need to make their votes count and use every platform to organise, speak, and negotiate. Modi's reduced numbers in the parliament in 2024 has already proven this. The growing menace that systematically works to erase Muslim voices from the national discourse through various forms of terror is comprehensive. Sometimes it is done through withholding online content and other times through threats and legal cases. This is what happened with the fact checker, Mohammad Zubair , who was arrested in six consecutive trumped up cases. He was recently booked under sedition for exposing a hate speech. Note here that the severity of action against the hatemonger is nothing compared to the charges against Zubair. In August 2024, two Muslim migrant workers from West Bengal were attacked by a mob of cow vigilantes in Haryana. One of them succumbed to his injuries. The other , however, managed to escape. Haryana Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini said that "It is not right to call it mob lynching,” because beef is illegal in Haryana. We don't know how the CM assumed that the two men had consumed beef. Around the same time, an elderly man was assaulted in a moving train by a mob on accusations of eating beef. On July 6 2024, the police in Uttar Pradesh booked two Muslim journalists for calling the murder of a Muslim man a ‘mob-lynching’. They were charged for creating communal unrest through malicious misreportage. All they did was report the family's version of the event. This is not an isolated incident in which those reporting on violence against Muslims have been targeted. On one hand, the Indian government has stopped publishing data on lynchings after calling its own methodology unreliable and on the other it attacks and tries to discredit every voice that investigates it. The few voices reporting on the lynchings are facing threats and censorship, gradually forcing them into silence. Indian Muslims see meanings twisted out of context everyday. For instance, a lynching is not reported as a lynching. Instead, it’s reported as the response to or punishment for a “robbery,” “child kidnapping”, or something similar. At the same time, a group of prominent right-wing clerics openly calling for genocide is dismissed and those calling them out might be booked under criminal charges. Reporting on this type of speech is considered “disturbing the peace.” The mainstream media has also shown little interest in these cases. The last decade saw a wave of hateful attacks through the news, social media, films, poetry, and music, to further invisibilise Muslims. Hate speeches are not confined to obscure corners, they dominate public discourse and are amplified by TV anchors and prominent social media influencers. A recent Human Rights Watch report pointed out that 110 out of 173 poll speeches by PM Modi contained Islamophobic remarks. Modi referred to Muslims as infiltrators and people producing more children. He even alleged that if the opposition won power, they'll give away the gold of Hindu women including their Mangalsutras to Muslims. Throughout the polls, BJP constantly published cartoons depicting Muslims as evil people eyeing the resources that belonged to Hindus. The PM’s message trickled down into the abyss of the bottomless cesspit, leading to more unhinged commentary by other leaders. This kind of hate mongering during elections is a first for India. It's a culmination of years of propaganda by WhatsApp troll armies and TV anchors like Suresh Chavhanke who dehumanise Muslims on live TV, and clerics like Yati Narsinghanand Giri who openly support the idea of a genocide of Muslims. The combination of these tactics seeks to marginalise Muslims and to systematically erase their presence in public life. The burden of proof and the onus to act in an "acceptable" way disproportionately falls on the Muslims. If they protest or turn bitter, that would reinforce negative stereotypes. Muslims must stay aware of these traps and not become silent. Be it the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) protests or the biggest political upset of Mr Modi's career in the recent Lok Sabha polls–in which he lost the majority in the parliament–Muslims have played a great role in these pushbacks. They have displayed resilience and resistance on many occasions which proves that they haven't given up on their citizenship. So, silence should not be an option. As a strategy, it is suicidal. Instead, they need to make their presence felt and reclaim public space. They must seek accountability from both the ruling party, as well as the opposition they voted for in large numbers. It's hard to predict how Muslims can break this cycle of violence and propaganda but what is clear is that they'll have to firmly stand up for themselves first if they want others to join them. SUB-HEAD Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Opinion Madhya Pradesh Demolition Uttar Pradesh Hindu Extremism Hindu Fascism Hindutva Thook Jihad Halal Muslim invisibility hypervisibility Invisibilizing Muslims Citizenship Amendment Act mob-lynching Dehumanization Land jihad bulldozing bulldozers Ghettoisation Ghettoization illegal homes BJP National Security Act Religious Conflict religious divide Lok Sabha Archive of Absence Career Politicians Modi Civil Society Displacement Economy Vendors Construction Despotism Disappearance Dissent Enforced Disappearances Extrajudicial Killings Execution Forced Disappearance Ghost Workers Human Rights Violations India democratic backsliding nationalism democracy housing urban development 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. 10th Jan 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:

Facing the jarring revival of chauvinist storylines in mainstream motion pictures, a new era of feminist film is cleaving its way into festival and global acclaim. Two such films—Don’t Cry, Butterfly (2024) and Santosh (2024)—debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival to a welcome reception. Celebrated for showcasing revelatory Asian women’s narratives from distinct perspectives, the features ebb and flow artfully between absurdity and reality, demarcating their respective protagonists’ experiences reclaiming autonomy, dignity, and justice in spaces and psyches consumed by patriarchy. · BOOKS & ARTS Review · Toronto Facing the jarring revival of chauvinist storylines in mainstream motion pictures, a new era of feminist film is cleaving its way into festival and global acclaim. Two such films—Don’t Cry, Butterfly (2024) and Santosh (2024)—debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival to a welcome reception. Celebrated for showcasing revelatory Asian women’s narratives from distinct perspectives, the features ebb and flow artfully between absurdity and reality, demarcating their respective protagonists’ experiences reclaiming autonomy, dignity, and justice in spaces and psyches consumed by patriarchy. Iman Ifthikhar, Untitled (2025). Digital painting. A Man's World “What can one do, Geetanjali? Sadly, it’s a man’s world,” roared Ranbir Kapoor’s quasi-alpha, male avenger in Sandeep Reddy Vanga’s blockbuster picture Animal (2023) . The film’s problematic psyche enveloped by an uber-massy exterior invigorated the pen of many critics. Several of them deciphered—in accordance with Vanga’s implied admissions—the film’s intrinsic toxicity as an attempt by the director to double down on his ethically-questionable brand of filmmaking, in response to those who questioned the philosophies of his previous films. His contempt towards his critics, the Hindi film industry, and its audiences is effectively ventriloquized through Animal’s glossy protagonist’s several loud, misplaced outbursts directed at society’s collective failure in recognizing the importance of the “ alpha male” —a stand-in metaphor for Vanga’s bratty brand of manchild protagonists. Following the shattering acclaim that Animal has enjoyed, the rhetorical question that Kapoor’s character screams at his wife, also becomes one that the film mocks the industry with. What can the audience, the critics, or the filmmakers do? Unfortunately, it is a man’s world. The answer presents itself in two films which screened at the Toronto International Film Festival this year. One Vietnamese and one Indian, both helmed by two distinct debutante women directors , where the protagonists are two distinct women holding their own against the patriarchy, while cleverly counteracting genre expectations (in essence, the opposite of Animal ). Dương Diệu Linh’s Don’t Cry, Butterfly (2024) and Sandhya Suri’s Santosh (2024) had triumphantly traveled the festival circuit before arriving at TIFF. Both films are equally poignant in their portrayal of patriarchy as an infestation: Linh’s quite literal and Suri’s more metaphorical, allowing for novel insights into the extent to which ours is, in fact, unfortunately, a man’s world. Still from Don't Cry Butterfly (2024). Image Courtesy of TIFF. Dương Diệu Linh’s Don’t Cry, Butterfly Linh’s fascination with the domestic and emotional perils of middle-aged Vietnamese women neatly threads through her filmography . Her debut feature follows a similar syntax as it documents the desperation of a wedding planner, Tam (Lê Tú Oanh), after she catches her husband philandering with a much younger woman during the broadcast of a nationally televised soccer game. This peculiar predicament sends Tam down an introspective spiral, forcing her to consult the services of a feng-shui master who advises her to make several lifestyle and appearance changes to save her decaying marriage, much to her daughter Ha’s (Nguyen Nam Linh) chagrin. An unwelcome companion to this crisis is a leak in Tam’s bedroom ceiling which persists endlessly, eventually metamorphosing into a tar-like sentient substance only visible to the women in the building, growing in size as Tam’s marriage gradually becomes comatose. The film’s quirky comedic overtone is thus assisted in willful contrast by a reliance on the supernatural, which cleverly conveys the thesis to the audience without conscribing to pre-existing genre tropes. Linh’s hyper-fixation on the specificity of Tam’s situation underscores the culturally informed mechanism through which Don’t Cry, Butterfly addresses the broader issue of patriarchy. The infestation, standing in as a symbol for patriarchal ambivalence, mimics the toxic phallocentric culture which allows Tam’s husband, Thanh ( Le Vu Long ), to slog around the house sans accountability or apology. There is a distilled direction in Linh’s style of storytelling which allows her to effectively sashay between the dry humor dominating the film’s dialogue and gripping moments of supernatural terror. While she employs the fantastical elements quite sparingly, she ensures their effect is well-informed, creating a horror-comedy that delivers across both departments. Linh also infuses the film with welcome observations about Vietnamese customs and society, creating a work that is global despite (or perhaps, because of) its nuances. “If we chop the dicks off of all cheating men, the whole country will be filled with eunuchs,” remarks Tam’s friend, in a statement where the ethos transcends borders. Don’t Cry, Butterfly is a stellar showcase of independent cinema, intelligently employing form and fiction to serve something beyond its broad thesis. You are reminded to trust the tale as told by the teller, absorbing all that the story has to offer you. Sandhya Suri’s Santosh Suri ’s Santosh, albeit not as creatively fluid, still effectively upturns expectations in pursuit of a grander purpose. Her previous narrative short, The Field (2018) , also produced by the British Film Institute (BFI) , functioned similarly, exploiting the beats of a conventional thriller to highlight the innocence of an extramarital affair in rural India. Her debut feature, Santosh , is centered around the eponymous character (Shahana Goswami) who, through a government scheme aimed at helping widows, replaces her deceased husband in the local police force. The “khaki” uniform adds heft to Santosh’s identity, which was previously reduced to doomed daughter-in-law and hapless widow. There is a purpose to her step in this new job where she operates in service of a greater truth. Her occupational idyll, however, is shattered when the murder of a Dalit girl exposes her to the malignance of those in power. Inaction by her superiors in addressing the victim’s family's concerns causes major uproar in the media, and a female inspector ( Sunita Rajwar ) is brought in to placate the situation. Suri, much like Linh, posits the primary crisis not as a means of tackling the problem, but as a portrayal of its entrenchedness, while branching out with equal enthusiasm towards subsidiary issues. The extent to which caste-based discrimination penetrates the fabric of Indian society rests at the forefront of the film’s ideas. But nestled within are communalism, patriarchy, police negligence, and an overall decay in India’s legislative, executive, and judicial institutions. The labored pacing, especially in the chase sequences and the static positioning of the camera, works in service of such multi-layered messaging, as the film delicately explores its ideas in lieu of arguing for them. This attributes a documentary quality to the film, where it presents the events in a rather quotidian manner, allowing for a measured confrontation with reality, rather than an exploitation of the events for contrived emotion. Still from Santosh (2024). Image courtesy of India Currents. The premise, which is reminiscent of Anubhav Sinha’s social thriller Article 15 (2019), avoids conscribing to the showmanship of cop films as idealized by those like Sinha’s but more prominently by those of Rohit Shetty in Hindi cinema. There is no euphoric release where Santosh batters the villains to a pulp. There is no “gotcha!” moment where Santosh wields the law to best the killer, locking them up for life. There is no monologue about the oppressive caste system or the abysmal statistics regarding women’s safety in India. Santosh trusts the viewer with its messaging, reinforcing the grim subject matter with an equally grim portrayal. The closest the film comes to giving us a heroic smash-the-patriarchy moment is a measured but revolting scene in which Santosh spits out her barely chewed meal to discomfort the gaze of a man staring at her. Despite its aspirations and twists in emotion and notion, the story eventually becomes predictable towards the end. The casting of an otherwise lovable Sunita Rajwar as a domineering inspector also falters in places owing to the relatively harmless characters she has taken up recently. Regardless of its shortcomings, however, Santosh stands out as a testament to a fearless brand of filmmaking that exhibits a flawed India, where the only thing separating the cop and the crook is a “khaki” uniform and a government-issued firearm. A refreshing deviation from the mainstream The meticulousness of both Don’t Cry, Butterfly and Santosh stands in stark contrast to the populist, pulpy, and policed cinema that is mass-produced in their respective countries, and in the absence of a commercially successful precedent, it becomes a monumental task to fund films like these. It thus becomes extremely crucial that films like Don’t Cry, Butterfly and Santosh , and filmmakers like Linh and Suri, who have been nurtured by Western institutions like Berlinale and the BFI, get this recognition in front of international audiences as it paves the way for such an “arthouse” brand of cinema to exist alongside the mainstream. The inter-continental efforts required to produce these films also stands as testament to the idea of global filmmaking, which is helping amplify regional voices, and preventing them from being strangled by the rigidity of their national cinemas and governments. Now, it remains to be seen whether either of Linh’s or Suri’s films are received with as much domestic fanfare as they were internationally. With both having been picked up by mid-size primary distributors, there is still hope that non-festival audiences get to enjoy these truly novel films. Nevertheless, there is a lot to be done: after all, it is, sadly, a man’s world. ∎ SUB-HEAD Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Review Toronto Chauvinism Motion Picture Film Cinema Feminism Film Festival Dont Cry Butterfly Santosh Toronto International Film Festival Art Criticism Absurdity Autonomy Rhetoric Duong Dieu Linh Sandhya Suri TIFF Indian Currents Filmography Vietnamese Indian Independent Cinema British Film Institute Caste-based Discrimination Arthouse Berlinale A Mans World 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. 2nd Mar 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:

“Not only has the neighborhood lost much of its middle-class transnational identity, but it is also being erased in the media and from the collective memory of Dubai. The livelihoods and lifestyles of Karama’s former inhabitants are threatened as the space for economic participation diminishes with the establishment of more exclusive, privatized, and upper-class modes of living and leisure in the area.” INTERACTIVE New Dubai's Capital Accumulation: The Story of Karama “Not only has the neighborhood lost much of its middle-class transnational identity, but it is also being erased in the media and from the collective memory of Dubai. The livelihoods and lifestyles of Karama’s former inhabitants are threatened as the space for economic participation diminishes with the establishment of more exclusive, privatized, and upper-class modes of living and leisure in the area.” VOL. 1 LIVE AUTHOR AUTHOR AUTHOR Follow our YouTube channel for updates from past or future events. ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: AUTHOR Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 AUTHOR Heading 5 Follow our YouTube channel for updates from past or future events. SHARE Facebook ↗ Twitter ↗ LinkedIn ↗ Live Dubai 5th Jun 2021 Live Dubai Demolition Event In Grief In Solidarity Development Gentrification Karama Jadaliyya Nationalism UAE Street Art Old Dubai New Dubai Dubai Creek Dubai frame Tourism Luxury Tourism Working-Class Spaces Property Rent Gap State-Sponsored Privatization Burj Al Arab Dubai Roads and Transport Abu Dhabi Middle East Capital Capital Expansion Production of Space Wasl Hub Housing Crisis Brand Dubai Deira Enrichment Project Legal Regimes Lack of Legal Recourse The Denial of Citizenship Nationality-based Hierarchies Immigrant Neighborhoods Employment State Modernization Narratives 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. “ Karama: An Immigrant Neighborhood Transformed ” is an essay by writer Bhoomika Ghaghada, published in Jadaliyya . Karama is where Ghaghada grew up. It is a place where Bollywood music was part of the background soundscape, where one could hear people speaking “ in Hindi, Urdu, and Tagalog. ” Of course, that was in the early 2000s—well before the gentrification of Karama began. Flanked by the Dubai frame were “ Old Dubai ” and “ New Dubai, ” signifiers for tourists who wished to see what “ historical ” neighborhoods looked like. Once a trading port and an affordable haven for South Asian immigrants, Karama has convulsed with massive change, what with the expulsion of many of its former residents as part of Dubai's vision of itself: a glitzy, skyscraper-dominated, upper-class, and rarefied space. As part of our online event In Grief, In Solidarity in 2021, Ghaghada—introduced by editor Vamika Sinha—read her poignant and incisive essay, one which is all the more important because of the dearth of writing on and from the large South Asian diaspora in the UAE. This rent gap became apparent and significant enough in 2014, soon after Dubai won the bid to host Expo2020. There was plenty of vacant land in Dubai, but two factors made building in undeveloped areas less attractive. First, Dubai was hit hard by the 2008 global financial recession. A bulk of real estate projects were put on hold and many were canceled. With the help of its neighbor city, Abu Dhabi , the Dubai real estate market would recover over the next five years. Second, developing new areas on the outskirts of the city was a relatively costly endeavor with a slower return on investment. It involved greater planning, land preparation, and setting up comprehensive infrastructure—inner roads from existing arteries, metro lines, and water and power lines. This financial reality made Karama an attractive site for redevelopment and capital expansion. 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

The Zeenat Haroon Rashid Prize Committee referred to Raniya Hosain as “an original voice with a striking command of her craft.” The essay for which she won the ZHR prize emerges from Hosain's reckoning with a dichotomy: the contradictory impulses of a rejection of the generality of women's experience of pain on one hand and a sense that there is some generality on the other, felt necessary for Hosain to think through. INTERACTIVE Chats Ep. 3 · On the 2020 ZHR Prize-Winning Essay Raniya Hosain The Zeenat Haroon Rashid Prize Committee referred to Raniya Hosain as “an original voice with a striking command of her craft.” The essay for which she won the ZHR prize emerges from Hosain's reckoning with a dichotomy: the contradictory impulses of a rejection of the generality of women's experience of pain on one hand and a sense that there is some generality on the other, felt necessary for Hosain to think through. A reading & discussion with Raniya Hosain, the winner of the Zeenat Haroon Rashid Prize for her essay “Portrait of a Woman in Pain.” In her discussion, Hosain discusses how, in women's organizing spaces, she felt a keen sense that despite wanting to do away with one's “womanhood,” it was womanhood itself that allowed her to feel solidarity. What universality, Hosain asks, can be found in the experience of gender. If recognizing that no one experience can create the whole seems necessary, why does the specific pain she outlines in her essay seem to be felt by all the women she knows or hears from? ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: AUTHOR Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 AUTHOR Heading 5 Subscribe to our newsletter for updates on SAAG Chats, an informal series of live events on Instagram. SHARE Facebook ↗ Twitter ↗ LinkedIn ↗ Live Pakistan Zeenat Haroon Rashid Writing Prize for Women Feminist Spaces Feminist Organizing Trauma Body Politics SAAG Chats Gender Gender Violence Despair Grief Depictions of Grief Essay Essayistic Practice RANIYA HOSAIN is a writer and doctoral student in Postcolonial Literature at the University of Cambridge. She is Editor at Spacebar Magazine . Live Pakistan 23rd Nov 2020 On That Note: Heading 5 23rd OCT Heading 5 23rd Oct Heading 5 23rd Oct

As Pakistan's militarized disappearance of everyday Baloch civilians continues, the vitality of the community in the age of social media has come to be preserved through “dossiers of memory”—online archives housed in tweet threads and on Facebook groups. These archives are tools of resistance—declarative visual pleas to local and global audiences that affirm the presence of the disappeared Baloch and connect their struggles to worldwide movements against enforced disappearances. · THE VERTICAL Essay · Balochistan As Pakistan's militarized disappearance of everyday Baloch civilians continues, the vitality of the community in the age of social media has come to be preserved through “dossiers of memory”—online archives housed in tweet threads and on Facebook groups. These archives are tools of resistance—declarative visual pleas to local and global audiences that affirm the presence of the disappeared Baloch and connect their struggles to worldwide movements against enforced disappearances. Sameen Agha, My House is on Fire (2021). Marble & mixed media on canvas. Who is Next? “Now that I have cleaned the dust from my son’s photograph, where should I keep it to find some relief? Wherever I place it, I feel as though the photograph is looking at me and talking to me.” These are Nako (Uncle) Mayar’s words, shared in a Facebook post on 19 December 2023. Nako Mayar first caught public attention when his photographs and videos went viral during a sit-in protest in Turbat , held against the extrajudicial killing of Balach Mola Bakhsh by the Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) in November 2023. He was later seen participating in the “ Long March against Baloch genocide ” to Islamabad, organized by the Baloch Yakjehti Committee. The public were deeply moved by the sight of this elderly man holding a picture, crying, cursing, lamenting, and pleading—showing the photograph to everyone who visited the sit-in or sat near him to express solidarity. “Look how handsome my son is”, he would say. These visuals of Nako Mayar were shared widely on Facebook and Twitter, making Baloch people aware of his plight. Nako Mayar, holding a framed photograph of his disappeared son, Fateh, during a protest. Image courtesy of the author. Nako Mayar hails from Zamuran, a sub-Tehsil of Buleda in district Kech, nearly 70 kilometers south of Turbat city. He spent most of his life as a shepherd, relying on subsistence farming. After the 2006 assassination of Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti during a military operation in Kohlu Dera Bugti—which ignited the current and fifth wave of the Baloch nationalist movement—however, the political situation in the region deteriorated. As military operations intensified in the B-areas (rural areas policed by Levies and Frontier Corps) of Balochistan, Nako Mayar migrated to Tehsil Buleda, district Kech to escape the violence. Buleda, more populated and equipped with slightly better facilities than Zamuran, offered relative safety compared to the isolated, violence-stricken rural areas. Additionally, military operations often targeted remote villages, forcing residents to move toward more concentrated settlements, where they could be easily monitored and controlled. In Buleda, he continued to live a modest life, relying on his goats and sheep. His son, Fateh Mayar, was a diligent student who attended school in the mornings and taught English at a local language institute in the evenings. Fateh earned his pocket money from teaching. According to Nako Mayar, his son Fateh was forcefully disappeared from Turbat Bazaar on 14 June 2023, when he went for Eid shopping. This incident completely altered Nako Mayar’s life, transforming him from a free and independent shepherd into a political subject. In many of the videos shared on social media, Nako Mayar can be heard saying, “My son is innocent. He doesn’t even have a Computerized National Identity Card (CNIC). He’s still a child, less than 18 years old.” One of the most poignant lines he often repeats while looking at his son’s photograph is, “I am cursed for giving my beloved Fateh an education. If you come back, I will not let you study. If he had been a shepherd, maybe nobody would have cared about him. I am seventy years old, and he is my only son. My son used to go to school in the morning and to the language institute in the evening. He is not involved in any kind of anti-state activities. His records are clear—they can check the school and language institute attendance. If he were involved in any such activities, how could he have taken his relative to the Frontier Corps camp doctors when he was stung by a scorpion? This should not happen to anyone.” He continues, “If the tyrants do not give me justice, may God hold them accountable. Oh God, question these tyrants on my behalf.” The story of Nako Mayar and his son Fateh is not just about personal tragedy but is emblematic of a much larger human rights crisis faced by countless families in Balochistan. Fateh is just one of thousands of young Baloch, predominantly students, who have been forcibly disappeared by Pakistan’s military and paramilitary forces. In his search for justice, Nako Mayar is one of many family members who tirelessly protest outside press clubs, march along roads holding photographs of their missing loved ones and engage in social media campaigns led by political organizations such as the Voice for Baloch Missing Persons (VBMP) and the Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC). They demand answers and the safe return of their sons, husbands, and brothers. Central to their struggle are the photos they hold. These photos, once treasured as personal memories, have now become powerful symbols of protest, keeping the stories of the disappeared alive. More than just reminders of the past, these photos break the silence that surrounds enforced disappearances, turning personal grief into a powerful act of public resistance. In Nako Mayar’s case, the photos of his disappeared son, Fateh, have become much more than just images. They represent a father’s grief, his unbreakable resilience, and his refusal to let his son’s story be forgotten. These photos draw people in, making them feel the weight of Fateh’s disappearance and compelling them to engage with his story. The photographs are not just keepsakes. They are reminders of the love families still hold and the pain they endure. Every time Nako lifts Fateh’s image at a protest or posts it online, he is refusing to let his son’s story be silenced. He is fighting against the state’s efforts to erase Fateh’s memory. These photos demand answers, pushing families and communities to keep speaking up for those who no longer have a voice. They push the stories of their loved ones out of the darkness, out of prison cells, and into the public eye. The fight for visibility and justice has also found its way into the digital realm, where families and activists have created virtual archives, to ensure that the stories of the disappeared are neither forgotten nor ignored. Social media platforms have become crucial sites for preserving these memories and amplifying their resistance. The “Voice for Baloch Missing Persons” (VBMP) Facebook page is a digital archive created by families to record the stories of their missing loved ones. Since its formation in 2009, VBMP has documented thousands of cases of enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings. Faced with a lack of attention from national and international media, families and activists have turned to social media to share their stories and gather support. Photograph from a sit-in camp near the Quetta Press Club. Image courtesy of the Voice for Baloch Missing Persons (VBMP) Facebook page. Beside the Quetta Press Club, VBMP maintains a permanent camp where portraits of the missing are displayed prominently. These photographs, larger than typical ID photos, are arranged in rows. The camp, lined with these images, serves as a powerful reminder of the families’ pain and their relentless demand for justice. Each day, VBMP’s page posts updates, counting the days since its encampment began and marking the time that families have spent waiting for answers. Digital platforms have also become vital tools for connecting the local struggle in Balochistan to a global audience. By using hashtags like #ReleaseAllBalochMissingPersons on digital sites, families are not only reaching out for local support but also appealing to international human rights organizations and diaspora communities. These posts, shared repeatedly, create an online archive of pain and resistance, reinforcing the community’s presence in digital spaces even as they are marginalized in physical ones. Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC) emerged in 2020 after the killing of four-year-old Bramsh Baloch’s mother, allegedly by one of the local death squads believed to be operating under Pakistani military intelligence. This devastating event sparked new waves of protests, with BYC leading numerous demonstrations, including the Long March against Baloch Genocide in 2023 and the Baloch Raji Muchi in 2024 . These events, led by Baloch women, brought attention to the suffering of the community, calling for basic rights and an end to state violence. Every year, on October 4, the family of Shabir Baloch —one of the many forcibly disappeared activists—launches a campaign, demanding answers. For his wife, Zarina Baloch, and his sister, Seema Baloch, the fight is not just for visibility but for recognition, acknowledgment, and the hope of bringing Shabir back home. This year on October 4, Zarina Baloch and Seema Baloch, launched a protest campaign demanding the whereabouts of Shabir Baloch. Zarina, Shabir’s wife, is often seen at protests, both in person and online, holding a placard that reads, “Am I married or a widow?” Zarina Baloch holds a sign with the words, “ Am I married, or a widow? " Image courtesy of X. Shabir Baloch was born in the Labach district of Awaran. He began his political journey as a student activist and was later elected as the Information Secretary of the Baloch Students Organization, Azad chapter (BSO-Azad). The BSO was banned by the Pakistani state as a terrorist organization due to its radical separatist stance on the issue of Baloch liberation. Shabir was arrested by the Frontier Corps while visiting Gwarkop, a village seventy kilometres far from Turbat city in the Kech district, with his wife, Zarina, during a raid on 4 October 2016. Along with Shabir, twenty-four other Baloch were detained in the raid, but all were eventually released—except for Shabir. Since then, his whereabouts remain unknown. “It was less than two years into our marriage when Shabir was abducted,” Zarina says. I still hear our laughter echoing in our bedroom when we were together.” For the past eight years, Zarina and Shabir’s sister, Seema, have been searching for justice. On 12 October 2016, Zarina went to the police station to file a report, but the authorities refused to register her case. In November 2016, she filed a petition in court, hoping to find her husband. Zarina and Seema brought Shabir’s case to the attention of international organizations like Amnesty International and the UN Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, but they received no response from the Pakistani government. The Pakistan Commission of Inquiry on Enforced Disappearances also took up Shabir’s case but failed to recover him. Instead, according to the Human Rights Council of Balochistan (HRCB), the commission intimidated and harassed Shabir’s family during the hearings. On October 4, 2024, HRCB tweeted , “On one occasion, a justice on the commission told Seema not to attend any more hearings. When she insisted, he remarked that if she was not a woman, she would have been kicked out of the office.” This is the struggle faced by every mother, sister, and wife of men, forcibly disappeared in Balochistan. These women protest and march tirelessly, often breaking down mid-speech while demanding answers, overwhelmed by panic attacks and grief. They find themselves navigating complex and indifferent government institutions. When they go to police stations to file their cases, they are refused. When they knock on courts’ doors, they are given endless dates for hearings without resolution. They work to have their loved ones’ names added to the lists of human rights commissions, but nothing changes. Instead, they are met with harassment, intimidating calls from authorities, and false assurances. Each day, the size of their case files grows thicker. With each passing year their hope and determination remain unwavering despite the system’s continued failure to deliver justice. One such file belongs to Saira Baloch—a plastic folder filled with photographs of her brothers, Asif and Rasheed. They were both arrested by Pakistani security forces at Zangi Nawad, a picnic spot in District Noshki, on 31 August 2018. Saira explains that while the security forces initially acknowledged the arrest, they later denied it. It has been six years since, and the family has received no information about the alleged crime, whereabouts, or legal basis for their detention. A folder with images of Asif and Rasheed. Image courtesy of X. Salman Hussain, an anthropologist, describes these files as “dossiers of memory.” It is a personal archive containing photographs, National Identity Cards, First Investigation Reports (FIRs), police complaints, court hearing dates, and handwritten notes from relatives. Personal notes often detail the dates and locations of abductions or provide outlines of speeches that families deliver at protests. The caption of one of Saira’s posts on X captures the essence of these memory dossiers, “Our happy life has been imprisoned first in pictures and then in files. Our wishes, dreams, and desires to live are locked inside this file. Will he (the disappeared) ever be able to come out of these torture cells and files?” T hese personal archives are much more than collections of old photos and documents, they are records of dreams, struggles, and resistance. When families share these photographs alongside their personal notes, they turn the images into powerful reminders of those who are missing, keeping their stories alive. With no physical remains to mourn, they use photographs to fill the space between life and death—where the missing is neither fully gone nor truly present. Sharing these photographs on platforms like Facebook or X is not just about raising awareness—it’s a way of saying, “We’re still here, and we will not be silenced.” Each post is a reminder that the state has failed to provide answers, yet these families will not stop demanding justice. For many relatives, searching for their missing loved ones has taken over their entire lives. Most of their days are spent protesting on the streets or sharing their stories online, refusing to let the world forget. By sharing these images, families also reclaim control over who is seen and remembered. Kashmiri and Palestinian scholars have called this a form of “counter-visuality,” where images serve as a tool to resist erasure and assert presence in spaces where they are denied. When a loved one disappears, families do not just lose a person, they lose part of their identity. They exist in a painful state of limbo, caught between being present and absent, struggling to find answers. Roles like wife, widow, parent, or child no longer fit. Instead, they become new political subjects, voices of resistance, marching in protest or campaigning on social media. Relatives who were once viewed as powerless victims have turned into powerful voices speaking out against state violence. This phenomenon extends beyond Baloch women, who have become symbols of resistance against enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings. Similar movements can be seen around the world. In Argentina, the Organization of Mothers of the Disappeared (Mothers of Plaza de Mayo) was formed in 1977, marking the first public protest against military rule. To this day, every Thursday, the Madres march around the Pirámide de Mayo in the center of Buenos Aires. In Guatemala , tens of thousands of people were disappeared during the 1960-1996 civil war between the military and leftist guerrilla forces, leading to enduring grief and activism by the families left behind. Likewise, in Jammu and Kashmir, the Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons (APDP) continues to fight for justice and accountability for those who have vanished under state-sponsored repression. In each of these cases, women have used public grief and emotional expressions—such as weeping and mourning—as powerful political tools, transforming fear into collective resistance against state violence. These movements against enforced disappearances have given rise to influential political figures such as Estela de Carlotto, Rigoberta Menchú Tum, Parveena Ahangar and Mahrang Baloch. Every time a new story of disappearance is shared online, the community holds its breath, wondering, “Who is next?” This question echoes through every gathering and protest, a reminder that the pain of enforced disappearances is far from over. A young girl at a protest holds up a frame with the question “Who Is Next?” Image courtesy of X. Who’s Next by Qasum Faraz translated by Sajid Hussain (2013) Life is a poster pasted on the city’s walls. With the passage of time, It changes the names and photos emblazoned on its chest. Some days it’s Allah Nazar, Some days it’s Abdul Nabi. On every remorseless road of time and occasion, On every square, The wind distributes bits of my self- Like pamphlets. There is a strike tomorrow: All the shutters in the market will drop their gaze. Time and space will become one in the din of rallies. The day and the night, The month and the year, Will wear the same colour. Every letter on banners, placards, and foreheads, Will march along with a sea of its own. Who knows what will happen then? I, as a character of a global story, Stand at a distance and think: “For whom?” Someone, from behind, puts a hand on my shoulder, And whispers, “Life is a poster pasted on the city’s walls.”∎ SUB-HEAD Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Essay Balochistan Pakistan Civilian Activism Archive of Absence Resistance Resistance Movement Enforced Disappearances Disappearance Militarism Protest Extrajudicial Killings Counterterrorism Department Long March against Baloch Genocide Baloch Yakjehti Committee Zamuran Buleda Kech Shepard Subsistence Farming Assassination Kohlu Dera Bugti Baloch Nationalist Movement Rural Policing Violence Monitoring Turbat City Turbat Bazaar Childhood Computerized National Identity Card Education Levies and Frontier Corps Human Rights Human Rights Violations paramilitary Military Occupation Voice for Baloch Missing Persons Memory Grief Public Space Photography Justice Visibility Social Media Facebook X Quetta Press Club Baloch Raji Muchi 2024 State Sanctioned Violence Baloch Students Organization BSO-Azad Liberation Gwarkop Amnesty International United Nations Working Group Intimidation Security Dossiers of memory Anthropology Counter-visibility Erasure State Erasure Who is Next? Qasum Faraz Sajid Hussain Poetry Translation 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 Mar 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:

“Not only has the neighborhood lost much of its middle-class transnational identity, but it is also being erased in the media and from the collective memory of Dubai. The livelihoods and lifestyles of Karama’s former inhabitants are threatened as the space for economic participation diminishes with the establishment of more exclusive, privatized, and upper-class modes of living and leisure in the area.” INTERACTIVE New Dubai's Capital Accumulation: The Story of Karama Bhoomika Ghaghada “Not only has the neighborhood lost much of its middle-class transnational identity, but it is also being erased in the media and from the collective memory of Dubai. The livelihoods and lifestyles of Karama’s former inhabitants are threatened as the space for economic participation diminishes with the establishment of more exclusive, privatized, and upper-class modes of living and leisure in the area.” “ Karama: An Immigrant Neighborhood Transformed ” is an essay by writer Bhoomika Ghaghada, published in Jadaliyya . Karama is where Ghaghada grew up. It is a place where Bollywood music was part of the background soundscape, where one could hear people speaking “ in Hindi, Urdu, and Tagalog. ” Of course, that was in the early 2000s—well before the gentrification of Karama began. Flanked by the Dubai frame were “ Old Dubai ” and “ New Dubai, ” signifiers for tourists who wished to see what “ historical ” neighborhoods looked like. Once a trading port and an affordable haven for South Asian immigrants, Karama has convulsed with massive change, what with the expulsion of many of its former residents as part of Dubai's vision of itself: a glitzy, skyscraper-dominated, upper-class, and rarefied space. As part of our online event In Grief, In Solidarity in 2021, Ghaghada—introduced by editor Vamika Sinha—read her poignant and incisive essay, one which is all the more important because of the dearth of writing on and from the large South Asian diaspora in the UAE. This rent gap became apparent and significant enough in 2014, soon after Dubai won the bid to host Expo2020. There was plenty of vacant land in Dubai, but two factors made building in undeveloped areas less attractive. First, Dubai was hit hard by the 2008 global financial recession. A bulk of real estate projects were put on hold and many were canceled. With the help of its neighbor city, Abu Dhabi , the Dubai real estate market would recover over the next five years. Second, developing new areas on the outskirts of the city was a relatively costly endeavor with a slower return on investment. It involved greater planning, land preparation, and setting up comprehensive infrastructure—inner roads from existing arteries, metro lines, and water and power lines. This financial reality made Karama an attractive site for redevelopment and capital expansion. ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: AUTHOR Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 AUTHOR Heading 5 Follow our YouTube channel for updates from past or future events. SHARE Facebook ↗ Twitter ↗ LinkedIn ↗ Live Dubai Demolition Event In Grief In Solidarity Development Gentrification Karama Jadaliyya Nationalism UAE Street Art Old Dubai New Dubai Dubai Creek Dubai frame Tourism Luxury Tourism Working-Class Spaces Property Rent Gap State-Sponsored Privatization Burj Al Arab Dubai Roads and Transport Abu Dhabi Middle East Capital Capital Expansion Production of Space Wasl Hub Housing Crisis Brand Dubai Deira Enrichment Project Legal Regimes Lack of Legal Recourse The Denial of Citizenship Nationality-based Hierarchies Immigrant Neighborhoods Employment State Modernization Narratives BHOOMIKA GHAGHADA is a writer, strategist, facilitator, and independent researcher, based in Dubai. She co-founded the non-profit initiative Gulf Creative Collective. Her work has appeared in Jadaliyya and Postscript Magazine . Live Dubai 5th Jun 2021 On That Note: Heading 5 23rd OCT Heading 5 23rd Oct Heading 5 23rd Oct

For Roma feminist scholar Nicoleta Bitu, Roma identity is intrinsically linked to intersectional feminism. Drawing on the familial lessons of her upbringing and her exposure to political activism as she came of age, Bitu introduces a new intellectual framework of gender equality and women’s liberation—one that not only benefits members of her ethnic community but also enriches broader discourse on feminist theory. · FEATURES Profile · Bucharest For Roma feminist scholar Nicoleta Bitu, Roma identity is intrinsically linked to intersectional feminism. Drawing on the familial lessons of her upbringing and her exposure to political activism as she came of age, Bitu introduces a new intellectual framework of gender equality and women’s liberation—one that not only benefits members of her ethnic community but also enriches broader discourse on feminist theory. Anna Rabko, Roma night (2024). Digital illustration. Theorizing the Romnie When asked how she became a Roma activist and built an entire career out of it, Nicoleta Bițu replied, with her childlike smile: “Well, it's a long story…” Bițu grew up in an exceptional Roma family where both parents proudly displayed their Roma identity during the communist era, a regime that spanned four decades and, like the rest of Eastern Europe, ended in 1989. While many “integrated” Roma hid their identity out of shame and fear of social repercussions, Bițu's parents lived their Roma identity publicly, almost like a manifesto. “My father was born and raised in a hut,” Bițu recalled. At 13, he ran away from home, went to Bucharest, and enrolled in an automotive school with a boarding facility. At that time, the left-wing Romanian state was strongly encouraging poor people to pursue an education, which allowed Bițu's father to stay in a boarding school. He was later recruited for the non-commissioned officers' school and continued with evening Law Faculty. Bițu emphasized how Romania’s left-wing government was crucial in giving her father the opportunity to become a general. “I wouldn't be here with you today if that socialist state hadn't given him that chance,” she stated. “Do you understand how important it is for a state to take responsibility for the education of poor children, creating human resources?” Bițu laments the loss of social democracy, which she saw as a benchmark in the 1990s. The communist regime in Romania lasted from 1947 to 1989 . A hopeful project which—according to historian Alexandru Groza—stopped the royalty from leeching off society and attempted to eliminate social inequalities in Romania, it transformed—during its implementation stage (before ‘64) and in its last two decades–into one of the cruelest dictatorships in 20th-century Europe. “My father was dedicated to Romania, loyal if you will,” Bițu said, “and he remained left-wing until he died.” Sometimes he was even “too nationalist” for her taste, which would cause disputes between them. “The entire police force knew him as Biță Țiganu ( Biță The Gypsy ),” she added, “because, no matter what, he never hid his identity.” Bițu comes from both a family of Roma aristocrats—from her mother’s side—and one of traditional coppersmiths dressed in skirts, vests, and headscarves, from a compact Roma community. She believes this background is why her family reacted seriously to every injustice. When racial discrimination was not even a topic of conversation in Romania, she grew up hearing the word “racism.” For Bițu, what she saw in her parents’ house was also a form of activism. In Roma culture, you have an obligation to help the extended family, and she remembers that the four-room apartment, in a neighborhood almost devoid of Roma, was always occupied. “Some came to attend school, some came to go to the doctor, some cousins ran away from home because her husbands beat her,” Bițu recalled. “We were somehow a family with resources—not necessarily material resources—we were never rich—but [in] resources of information, networks, space [instead].” In 1977, Nicolae Gheorghe , who would become the father of Romani civic activism in Romania and Nicoleta Bițu’s husband, entered Bițu Țiganu ’s family. In the Romania of the '90s, society was marked by riots between Romanians, Hungarians, and Roma, leading to the destruction of hundreds of houses, deaths, and the displacement of large groups of Roma population. Hatred against others boiled in the blood of post-communist Romanian society. Nicolae, who had brought the necessary funds for rebuilding houses burned during an interethnic conflict, took Bițu to work with the Roma. She was 21 and it was her first year being an activist. One year later, in 1992, she was admitted to the Faculty of Sociology and Social Work in Bucharest, among the first generation that occupied the special places reserved for Roma students. “I was fascinated by Nicolae Gheorghe's personality,” she reflected, “though I don't think there was anyone who wasn't. But Roma activism was our inspiration. We protested. We went out into the field. Somehow, it gave you a sense of purpose. It was hard not to fall in love with him; I don't think I was the only one. He had extraordinary courage to fight everyone for the Roma.” At the age of 40, in 2010, Bițu began her Ph.D. at the National School of Political Science and Public Administration in Bucharest. Her thesis, Roma Women and Feminism, was the first in Romania to address the subject of Roma feminism. In 1993, she became one of the founders of the Romani CRISS center , an NGO that provides legal assistance in cases of abuse, remaining with them until she left the country for the first time in 1999. Bițu lived with her husband and two daughters in Warsaw, Poland, for seven years. For Biţu, the anchor remained her proximity to her community and her responsiveness to their suffering. “It didn't matter to me what non-Roma people said about us,” she said. ”Perhaps it was due to the dignity with which I was raised, that I didn't require validation from non-Roma individuals to know who I am.” Although she was very proud of her father as a public figure, Nicoleta Bițu strongly disapproved of many of his behaviors within the family. She believes her becoming a feminist was no coincidence—that the violence she witnessed (her father's against her mother) played a decisive role. She raised her voice at every opportunity, claiming she didn't believe a father who beat his wife could truly love his children. “I was very young when I started asserting this in the family,” Bițu recalled. “I had no contact with feminist literature back then, I was just reacting to injustice the way I was taught to.” As a student in 1993, she wrote her first essay about Roma women in conflicts and how they ensure the continuity of everyday life, based on her fieldwork from conflict-affected communities. “Little did I know that it was feminism,” Bițu reflected. There were also moments when Bițu clashed with some of her male Roma colleagues over how they treated her. In the 1990s, the tendency to control women's sexuality was pronounced, especially among Roma women, who were severely punished for engaging in sexual relationships outside marriage. “I was the subject of such discussions where I was called a whore,” confessed Bițu, who then started reading everything she could find on the subject of women’s rights and female sexuality. In 1998, at a meeting of Roma women in Budapest she met the directors of the women’s program at the Soros Foundation in New York, who invited her overseas the following year. Bițu was 28 at the time but had over nine years of activism experience, with just two breaks, worth three months each, to breastfeed her children. It was only in New York that Bițu received her first real feminist books from one of the directors with whom she developed a deep friendship, including bell hooks, Simone de Beauvoir, Angela Davis, and Kimberlé Crenshaw. “My bible was Ain't I a Woman by bell hooks,” shared Bițu, for whom the book provided answers to many of her personal questions in the Roma movement. “I never let go of that book; I felt that woman was speaking to me.” In 1999, Bițu presented the first report to the Council of Europe on the situation of Roma women in Europe and has since continued tirelessly on the path of feminism. Her discourse has evolved over time, she said, from blaming Roma culture to focusing on racism and later on misogyny. “When I first heard the concept of intersectionality, the sky lit up for me,” Bițu reflected. “These were such moments of enlightenment that helped me reinterpret and reach a nuanced discourse, sufficient to do justice to my people, but also to help me understand myself, as a person and a woman, from a historical and intersectional perspective.’ When she began her Roma feminist trajectory, she was called a traitor to her people for “distracting attention from the racism against Roma” to address a portion of it towards Roma feminism. “Intersectionality somehow gives you the opportunity to analyze the problem as a whole,” Bițu shared. “It gives me the example of early marriages, which are not just about misogyny but also about historical racism.” Early and forced marriages are still a problem in Romania. The 2021 census revealed that 521 girls aged 11 to 14 were living in so-called “consensual unions.” Although this type of abuse is not unique to Roma communities, it is believed to be partly an inherited consequence of the so-called “right of the first night ” of Romanian landowners over their Roma slaves, during the centuries-long Roma slavery on Romanian territory. To prevent their masters from exercising this right , Roma families often preferred to marry their daughters at a very young age. For Bițu, feminism has brought to light a historical perspective that did not exist before. From the way she understood feminism and the responsibility she felt over reconstructing the suppressed identity of her people, she turned towards art, culture, and historical documentation. During the last decade and a half, Nicoleta Bițu’s life has been marked by the construction of spaces, identity, and culture, different from the traditional, oral ones, that are lived in communities. She contributed to the Roma digital archive, European Institute of Roma Art and Culture, and the Roma Museum. “Unfortunately, today there are [even] fewer women in the Roma movement than there were in my time,” Bițu claimed. “It's a very tough men's world,” she continues decisively, almost with anger. “It's very hard to stand upright. I'm talking about myself now. I can't speak for others. The thing is, they [men] won't accept you as an equal, and when you reach the same level as them, you become a danger, and they come after you.” Are there any Roma male feminists in Romania? “No,” she answered. “Nobody. In words only, yes. But not in their personal lives and inner beliefs.” In 2019, Bițu migrated to England without a concrete plan. Initially, Bițu worked at a product packaging warehouse, in her own words, “experiencing humility in a dignified manner.” However, her path took a significant turn when she attended a job fair organized by a foundation dedicated to aiding the homeless. There, she applied for a position as a social worker and secured an interview, eventually joining the team in central London devoted to assisting 120 Roma individuals experiencing homelessness. Bițu couldn't help but question the twists of fate that led her back to a similar situation, thousands of kilometers away from home. Her family teased her about the irony of her journey, yet she came to realize that she hadn't left behind her people, but rather expanded her engagement with the Roma movement beyond Romania. With newfound determination, she dedicated the next four years to establishing a comprehensive service focused on supporting Roma living on the streets of London, proudly securing its funding until March 2025. In 2023, a spate of assaults targeting women sleeping on London's streets within three months signaled societal shifts: Brexit, the ascent of the right-wing, and the passing of anti-migration legislation , akin to a tightening noose around Bițu’s neck. Last year, she returned home; after feeling she had been away from her daughters for too long and preferring to spend her remaining years with them. Bițu is presently on hiatus, yet she vows to remain steadfast in the Roma cause until her last breath. Her time in London taught her that regardless of her whereabouts or endeavors, she cannot escape herself or her work as a Roma activist. Numerous Roma feminists are marked by Nicoleta Bițu’s work and personality. One of them is Ionela Pădure. She met Bițu in 2005, at the age of 19, and described her as the first Romani feminist voice she remembers. “For me,” Pădure shared, “Nicoleta Bițu was, and still is, a complex Roma woman because she embodies all these roles: the mother of two beautiful daughters, the wife of Nicolae Gheorghe, an intellectual, and an activist–roles that, in Romania, were often seen as vulnerabilities. Yet, she knew how to juggle them, turn them into strengths, and carve out a space for herself in a male-dominated world, all while coming from a traditional community. To this day, she remains a dedicated mother, an activist working on the ground, and an intellectual who writes academic articles.” Pădure comes from a family of settled Roma, musicians, and blacksmiths. She holds a degree from the Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales in Paris and has taught French at a college in France. However, she decided to return home to teach the Romani language in a village 40 km from the capital. Recently, she left formal education and, together with her husband, founded CPCD Vizurești, an NGO that organizes activities for village children, including Indian dance, drumming, Romani language lessons, boxing workshops, and more. Pădure described Bițu as a reference point for younger Romani women activists, who are just at the beginning of their careers—a mother they can talk to about anything. “Knowing she’s by my side gives me a sense of security,” Ionela said. She also credits role models like Bițu for helping her imagine herself and set new expectations. “I, too, married young and wanted to be a mother,” Pădure reflected. “Meeting Nicoleta and seeing her embodying all those roles made me realize that I could also make them all.” Oana Dorobanțu, similarly, is a queer feminist author, former journalist, human rights communication expert, and co-editor, together with Carmen Gheorghe, of one of the key books examining anti-roma racism in Romania. She doesn’t want to be called an activist or a feminist. “Shouldn’t we all be activists and feminists?” Dorobanțu asked, refusing to define herself. “I don’t know how words could ever do justice to all the admiration, respect, and love I have for this person,” she said, referring to Bițu. “I met Nico when I was 27, and she was by my side in the period after I decided to publicly acknowledge that I am of Romani ethnicity. The fact that she immediately accepted me as a Romnie (Roma woman in Romani language) was of great support for me.” For Dorobanțu, Bițu “embodies feminism.” She believes that all Romani feminists, not just in Romania, owe Bițu a great deal. "Many may see her as being in the shadow of her husband, Nicolae Gheorghe, who was also a major activist,” Dorobanțu noted, “but they were together because they were equals in every sense." One of the things Dorobanțu learned from Bițu is that there is no room for pride in activism, that you get involved in the movement for liberation, not for a résumé, ego, or reputation. She also learned that it’s important to know when to step back from the fight and when to return stronger, when to stay silent despite insults, and when to fight back. “Nicoleta was never didactic or pedantic,” Dorobanțu recalled, “but she influenced us indirectly through her nature, her charisma, and her way of being.”∎ SUB-HEAD Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Profile Bucharest Roma Romnie Feminism Activism Political Activism Liberation Gender Equality Politics of Ethnic Identity Feminist Theory Nicoleta Bitu Communist Era Eastern Europe History Leftism Democracy Romania 20th Century Europe Bita The Gypsy Aristocracy Community Injustice Nicolae Gheorghe Civic Activism Riots Civil Society Conflict Interethnic Conflict Political Science Roma Women and Feminism Romani CRISS Center NGO Violence Domestic violence Feminist Literature bell hooks Simone de Beauvoir Angela Davis Kimnerle Crenshaw Council of Europe Misogyny Racism Intersectional Forced Marriage Right of the first night Suppression Reconstruction Space Place Identity Tradition Oral History Archive European Institute of Roma Art and Culture Roma Museum Roma Movement Migration Homelessness St. Mungo's Anti-migration Legislation Academia Culture The Romanian Problem Hecate CPCD Vizurești Oana Dorobanțu 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. 3rd Feb 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:

Aruna D’Souza’s latest book, Imperfect Solidarities, asserts that despite alliances, relations, or understanding, solidarity can remain imperfect and imbalanced; however, if pursued collectively, it’s worth fighting for. BOOKS & ARTS Provocations on Empathy Aruna D’Souza’s latest book, Imperfect Solidarities, asserts that despite alliances, relations, or understanding, solidarity can remain imperfect and imbalanced; however, if pursued collectively, it’s worth fighting for. GENERAL REVIEW AUTHOR AUTHOR AUTHOR "Rug" (2018), Silkscreen printing and unraveling on silk, courtesy of Areen. ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: AUTHOR Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 AUTHOR Heading 5 "Rug" (2018), Silkscreen printing and unraveling on silk, courtesy of Areen. SHARE Facebook ↗ Twitter ↗ LinkedIn ↗ Review Paris 13th Aug 2025 Review Paris Grief Depictions of Grief In Grief In Solidarity Palestine The Urgent Call of Palestine Mistranslation and Revolution photography Archival Practice Archives Ethnography ethnographic objectification Colonialism On Opacity Art Activism Movement Strategy Activist Media Unknowability Doubt Felix Gonzales-Torres Teju Cole Art as Solidarity Strategies of Solidarity Colonial Documentation Stephanie Syjuco Fargo Nissim Tbakhi Isabella Hammad Improvisation Resistance Language as Resistance Imagery TJ Demos Aestheticide Édouard Glissant Essay Essayistic Practice Care Work 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. Near the end of Imperfect Solidarities (Floating Opera Press, 2024), Aruna D’Souza quotes her child’s frank question: “How can you not end up loving something that you have to take care of?” In D’Souza’s latest book, presented as a collection of essays on art and literature, the writer and art historian contemplates these prescient and recurring questions through formal and contextual analysis. Reflecting on the now and fairly recent past, she navigates the reader through buzzwords and emotional sinkholes while offering reflections “developed from looking.” Almost journal-like, this collection halts, pokes, and condemns as much as it seeks, weeps, and oscillates. D’Souza calls forth iterations of solidarity found in the work of artists including Felix Gonzalez-Torres and Stephanie Syjuco, as well as writers such as Amitav Ghosh, Dylan Robinson, and Édouard Glissant. She further positions contemporary instances of conflict, specifically her remote witnessing of the genocide in Gaza, as impetus for critical engagement, grounding it in her practice of art critique. Is it possible, today, to not consume and be consumed by the fraught tensions playing out on almost every continent? Beneath a fingertip lies a deluge of information, horror, so-called “debate”, and virtue signalling. While Palestine's ongoing oppression has long been and continues to be discussed, the events since 7 October 2023 rightly encourage renewed thinking. When newsfeeds are ceaselessly refreshing and every new story hangs like a heavy shadow, D’Souza articulates the stuffy stagnation of being on this side of witnessing. Yet, with her text, she encourages recognition and reckoning. In the face of overwhelm, she motivates critique as a strategy of response: “My horror gives way to analysis, not only of the geopolitical situation itself, but of the way ordinary people are responding to what is unfolding.” Imperfect Solidarities is, as she offers, “a tentative gesture” towards how global solidarities can be invoked to compel care and action, however imperfectly. But how could anyone write, now ? What more can be said? Why isn’t what has been said enough? In the collection’s first essay, “Grief, Fear, and Palestine, or Why Now?”, D'Souza condemns complacency as a byproduct of familiarity. Outlining the co-dependence of the US and Israel, she acknowledges, “as a US taxpayer, I am funding the atrocities happening in Gaza every day.” By this admission, to invoke solidarity must, therefore, definitively be enacted despite and because of this entanglement. If silence is taken as implicit acceptance, then surely it is to actively encourage, too. To take time, to write, and to analyze, becomes D’Souza’s method of engagement. Sitting with her pages, the familiar formula of visual analysis and exhibition reviewing is strangely comforting. Using examples in art and literature, she outlines strategies for refusal found in creative output, exploring how others have contemplated empathy through conflict. Through this structure, she is able to draw out parallels that highlight how art(work) can model different strategies of solidarity. This focus is significant to Gaza, because, as historian and critic TJ Demos points out, “by targeting the cultural infrastructure of Palestinian identity, this violence [by Israel], which could be termed aestheticide, destroys collective ways of knowing and feeling, breaks connections between generations, history, and nationhood, and thus contributes to Israel’s genocidal project of complete erasure.” Teju Cole, attempting to contend with this loss after his visit to Palestine in 2014, also draws throughlines back to creation: “Photography cannot capture this sorrow, but it can perhaps relay back the facts on the ground. It can make visible graves, olive trees, refuse, roofs, concrete, barricades, and the bodies of people. And what is described by the camera can be an opening to what else this ground has endured, and to what its situation demands.” Although neither Gaza’s artists nor its cultural histories are the core focus of the book, the titular motif of an imperfect solidarity is often returned to with Gaza implied. Thinking in dialogue, D’Souza uses other, perhaps more familiar, examples for readers to find a cultural grounding around her core thesis of solidarity across conflicts. While loss spirals and genocidal powers contort themselves in new ways to evade complicity, she encourages the reader not to turn inwards to the point of inaction, but to continue, perhaps also creatively—despite imperfections or imbalanced alliances. “I dream of a world in which we act not from love,” she declares, “but from something much more difficult: an obligation to care for each other whether or not we empathize with them.” The essay “Mistranslation and Revolution” invites reflection on language as a site of resistance. While D’Souza acknowledges that “sitting with incomprehension is an uncomfortable act”, she offers obfuscation as a methodology for solidarity, levity, and perhaps solace. Incorporating an analysis of Amitav Ghosh’s vast novel Sea of Poppies (2008) — a historical saga on colonial resistance in India—she notes how language is employed in establishing power through (mis)translation and (mis)understanding. This is particularly evident in how character relationships are set out. Language is central to the navigation of relating between characters, so much so that Ghosh describes, through his narrator, how new dialects are evolved through use and how understanding transcends commonality. Showing her reader exactly how Ghosh achieves this, she quotes the book’s narrator, who describes: “a motley tongue, spoken nowhere but on the water, whose words were as varied as the port’s traffic, an anarchic medley of Portuguese calaluzes and Kerala pattimars, Arab booms and Bengal paunch-ways, Malay proas and Tamil catamarans, Hindusthani pulwars and English snows—yet beneath the surface of this farrago of sound, meaning flowed as freely as the currents beneath the crowded press of boats.” In the gaps and improvisations resulting from (mis)communication, Ghosh demonstrates a freedom in the space which finding (un)commonality creates. Thinking through the construction of language through its structures, D’Souza acknowledges its leakiness, and how comprehension and connection often require transcending direct translation. In her analysis of Ghosh’s text, she draws on how language can be an imperfect access point or even a protective barrier across differences. Pushing this point home, she offers: “Communication through the thicket of mistranslation is an act of generosity.” And yet, I pause on certain words D’Souza uses—‘siege’, ‘negligence’, ‘allies’, ‘incomprehension’, ‘unruliness’—and struggle to get beyond how language has still felt so futile as of late. In an article titled “ Acts of Language ”, author Isabella Hammad discusses the weaponizing of words through the increasingly contentious topic of ‘free speech’ in the USA . Warning against essentialism, she reminds us that: “Bombs were not made of language, and they certainly were not metaphors.” Yet, what of language that is weaponized, where certain realities are overruled, classified away, filed, and manoeuvred around within documents, as in the case of the numerous ICJ rulings or green card removals? What of legal terminologies and judicial standards that are warped and bent to persecute a manufactured villain? Focusing on the difficult and thorny work of comprehending the ‘now’, personal interpretation is central to the work of this book. By incorporating Ghosh’s strategies for communication across and in spite of differences, D’Souza reminds the reader of the fallibility of language. Invoking its futility, she encourages that “to be able to act together without full comprehension, is to be able to float on the seas of change.” Similarly instructive is artist and writer Fargo Nissim Tbakhi’s essay “Notes on Craft: Writing in the Hour of Genocide”, where he acknowledges the importance of writing as a way to make sense of traumatic events. Despite being in “the long middle of revolution”, writing becomes a tool for action; a way to witness and begin the process of comprehension. Courtesy of the author. Although Imperfect Solidarities offers a broad focus on art too, decidedly few illustrations are presented alongside the text . As a result, D’Souza makes room for thinking about imagery without a continuous re-posting of images. One artwork included is a still from Stephanie Syjuco’s video work, Block Out the Sun (Shield) (2019). The work is captioned as a photographic intervention and included in the essay ‘Connecting through Opacity’, in which D’Souza summons Glissant’s seminal text ‘On Opacity’ from his book Poetics of Relation (1990). In this text, Glissant makes a case for abstraction and the opaque as a mode of engagement. D’Souza applies this concept to artworks where artists refuse to make themselves, or their work, understandable to the hegemonic (white) gaze. D’Souza’s reading of Syjuco’s work emphasizes how disrupting colonial documentation can be an act of care. The work connects Western tropes of looking-as-learning with an expectation of access—like textbook botanical drawings, anatomy models, and the extremes of restitution debates on human remains trapped in European museum vaults. The included still from Syjuco’s five-minute video shows an archival black-and-white group portrait, covered by the artist’s hands. The photograph follows a typical format of colonial documenting: an assembly of people posed stiffly before a foreign gaze. While enough of the figures can be seen, locating the image as ethnographic objectification, Syjuco’s hands perform a critical intervention of care. The artist challenges the use of photography to dehumanise—a technique Teju Cole neatly articulates as ‘weaponized’—through colonial methods of recording, categorizing, and labeling. By discussing this work in relation to opacity, D’Souza links Syjuco’s intervention as creating a reparative barrier. Through contextual analysis, D’Souza further examines how Syjuco affirms opacity through masking, in the present, against archival record. By covering “unwilling subjects’ faces and bodies, [Syjuco is] shielding them from our prying looks.” Bringing the act of repair into the present, D’Souza emphasizes the implication of complicity ( our looking), and the act of interception as shielding or abstraction. She shows how Syjuco’s work is a visual recalibration—where critical analysis can draw out space to think through new solidarities across past and present interactions. D’Souza brings in two more creative works which specifically utilize what she terms ‘ungraspable’—intentionally obscuring direct comprehension using abstraction—to explore opacity as resistance. The first is Felix Gonzales-Torres’ quietly heart-wrenching, replenishable installations from the 1994 exhibition Travelling , created as the artist was nearing the end of his life in his battle with AIDs. Visitors were allowed to both consume and even take the works in this exhibition, activating the cycle of loss and return through objects acting as metaphor. The restraint and simplicity of these pieces encompass the methods of opaque meaning-making Gonzales-Torres is so cherished for. The second work is Dylan Robinson’s text Hungry Listening: Resonant Theory for Indigenous Sound Studies , in which Robinson instructs “the non-Indigenous, settler, ally, or xwelítem readers to stop reading” at precise points, in order to retain Indigenous sovereignty and sanctity of ritual. Noting a number of devices that reinforce opacity in Robinson’s work, D’Souza highlights that even with the text’s title, “Robinson positions settler forms of listening, too, as a kind of voracious demand for transparency”. Both Gonzales-Torres’ and Robinson’s productions of opacity exemplify a mode of refusal—for Gonzales-Torres, using objects as symbolic placeholders, and for Robinson, using instructional writing to challenge entitlement and expectation. D’Souza includes opacity as a proposition for solidarity without the expectation of empathy, wondering “what sort of solidarities and alliances we might form on the basis of such mutual respect, one in which we acknowledge our right not to translate ourselves into terms that another may understand.” Through engaging artworks, she weaves in questions of agency, autonomy, and perspective in self-presentation for a public gaze. Syjuco’s and Robinson’s works invoke opacity through restriction, which D’Souza then uses to discuss who can engage, how engagement is possible, and who works should be for. D’Souza explores a number of other artworks in the book, ranging across themes of revolution, whiteness, connection, and difference. Her discussions centre creativity and its resulting forms—novels, video art, installation, exhibition curation—to explore different manifestations or strategies of empathy and solidarity. In doing so, she invites readers to view the creative act as a method to temper anxieties.. Reading Imperfect Solidarities in dialogue with Tbakhi’s ‘long middle’ situates it within the now. When D’Souza asks, “Are there ways to sit with the unknowability?”, she continually embeds encouragement for collective thought, to work through provocations on knowledge and access. She further highlights the potential for new interpretations of them by re-looking through the lens of seeking solidarity. Especially today, while it may often feel easier to fall into overwhelm, this collection is a reminder of the critical work which exists, and many ongoing, bolstering conversations that can be revisited. By gathering work for analysis in Imperfect Solidarities , the book seeks out strategies for ongoing engagement—from finding playful gaps in language to creating protective opacities. In ‘Coda’, D’Souza returns finally to the question of care. Taking a cue from her child—who learns to ‘care’ through the repeated actions required of looking after their pet (feeding, cleaning, playing)—she asserts that by caring, love can be fostered in time. But, she states: “care must come before love.” Cautioning against idealism, she reminds us that “care is [still] infinitely harder than love, because it often requires us to act in spite of our empathy, rather than because of it”. This is a deliberate and telling final note. Imperfect Solidarities ultimately asserts that despite our alliances, relations or understandings of and with each other, solidarity will always remain somewhat imperfect and imbalanced. But, if it is continued to be sought collectively, it’s worth fighting for.∎ 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

Gujarat’s Surat was the capital of the global diamond trade before the Russia-Ukraine war, but sanctions imposed on Russia’s diamond exports since 2022 have placed a sword to the throats of diamond workers in the collapsing industry’s headquarters. Mass layoffs and obscene wage cuts have led to dozens of labourers dying by suicide, leaving hundreds of their family members to cope without support from the Indian government. THE VERTICAL Expunging India's Diamond City Hanan Zaffar · Danish Pandit Gujarat’s Surat was the capital of the global diamond trade before the Russia-Ukraine war, but sanctions imposed on Russia’s diamond exports since 2022 have placed a sword to the throats of diamond workers in the collapsing industry’s headquarters. Mass layoffs and obscene wage cuts have led to dozens of labourers dying by suicide, leaving hundreds of their family members to cope without support from the Indian government. Roshan, 20, remembers his father, Ram Nagina Singh , as a hardworking man who spent decades polishing diamonds that would glitter in luxury stores across the world. But this October, Singh’s life came to a devastating halt. Based in the western Indian city of Surat, he once earned a comfortable salary of ₹60,000-₹70,000 ($800-$900) a month but was soon barely scraping by on ₹10,000-₹12,000 ($120-$150) as the city’s diamond industry buckled under immense economic pressures. The stress proved too much. Singh took his own life, hanging himself from the ceiling fan in his bedroom. Roshan is still grappling with his father’s sudden death. “My father didn’t say much, but we knew he was under immense stress,” Roshan recalled. “There was no work in the company, and he wasn’t receiving his wages or bonuses. He used to come home and talk about it, but we didn’t realise the depth of his despair until it was too late.” Singh’s story is tragically common. He is one of at least 65 diamond workers in Surat who have died by suicide in the past 16 months as financial hardships have deepened following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. For decades, Surat has been the world’s epicenter for diamond polishing, employing over 600,000 workers . However, since the onset of the war, sanctions targeting Russia —one of the largest exporters of rough diamonds— have sent shockwaves through the city’s once-thriving diamond industry. Both the supply of raw materials and the demand for polished Russian diamonds have drastically decreased. The European Union and G7 nations have implemented strict bans on Russian diamonds, including those routed through intermediary countries. This has severely disrupted the flow of raw diamonds to India’s factories, leaving thousands of workers in Surat unemployed and struggling to survive. The crisis has had a ripple effect, leading to widespread layoffs , wage cuts, and—tragically—suicides. A Suicide Epidemic Like Roshan, Jayantibhai’s world fell apart three months ago when her 28-year-old son, Mikunj, took his own life after losing his job. Once a diamond polisher, Mikunj had been out of work for over three months. Unable to secure another job as Surat’s diamond industry crumbled, he grew increasingly depressed. His sudden death left a gaping void in the family. “He never said anything to us,” Jayantibhai said. “What can we do now? He was our only son.” Without Mikunj, the family is struggling. At 60, Jayantibhai is too frail to work. She has already survived two heart attacks and relied on her son’s income to support the household. Her daughter-in-law, Rupali, has also stopped working. She used to tutor children from home, earning just enough to contribute. After Mikunj’s death, she withdrew entirely. “We needed him,” Jayantibhai said, her eyes welling up. “Now we are left to fend for ourselves, praying for help.” Her plight mirrors that of dozens of other families in Surat, staring at an uncertain future. Beyond the economic toll, the ongoing crisis in the diamond industry has triggered a significant mental health crisis among workers. The stress of unemployment and an uncertain future has pushed many to their breaking point. “Yes there are thoughts in my mind about suicide,” says Gohil Vijaybhai, another struggling diamond worker. For Vijaybhai, the past two years have been a relentless search for work. Once a steady earner in Surat’s diamond industry, he now moves from one labour site to another, hoping to make ₹500-700 ($6-8) per day. His company shut down when the economic slowdown, fuelled by the Russia-Ukraine war, cut off the supply of rough diamonds. “I’ve been doing this for 11 years, but now there’s nothing,” he shared. His income, once around ₹30,000 ($360) a month, has evaporated, leaving him in debt and unable to pay for necessities like rent and his children’s school fees. His three children, ranging from kindergarten to fifth grade, are now at risk of being forced out of school. “I told the school to wait for six or seven months for the fees,” he said, though he knows the money is unlikely to come. Without stable work, his family of seven depends on sporadic daily wages, and his debt continues to mount. “What can a single labourer do?” he asked. “We take out loans just to survive.” As his financial troubles deepen, Vijaybhai admits to feeling overwhelmed by despair. “When someone is under this much tension, what would he do? Suicide, right?” he asked. He is not alone; many diamond workers in Surat find themselves caught between a failing industry and rising debts. Deepak Rajendrabhai Purani, a diamond worker for over 10 years, describes the stark reality workers like him face. “I used to earn ₹25,000-₹27,000 ($300-$350) a month, but now I’m lucky if I make ₹15,000 ($180),” he said. “Some months, there is no work at all, and I have been sitting at home for weeks without any income.” Deepak, who lives in Surat with his parents, wife, and young son, is contemplating leaving the diamond industry but does not know where to turn after working there for so long. “I don’t know anything else. But how can I continue like this? We have bills to pay, mouths to feed, and no government support.” Deepak’s father, who once sold samosas from a cycle, is now bedridden with asthma. His brother, also a diamond worker, is one of the few fortunate ones who still has steady work. But Deepak knows this could change at any moment. “The companies keep only as many workers as they need,” he explained. “If there is no work, they tell us not to come in the next day. It’s as simple as that.” “There are no bombs thrown at us directly,” he added, “but this [Russia-Ukraine] war has killed us.” A Global Crisis Turning the Tide on Surat With disruptions in the supply of rough diamonds from Russia, many factories in Surat have either shut down or significantly scaled back their operations . This has left thousands of diamond workers, many of whom have spent decades in the industry, struggling to make ends meet. India’s diamond sector plays a vital role in the global diamond supply chain, with approximately 80% of the world's rough diamonds being cut and polished in the country. Surat, in particular, is the epicenter of this labour-intensive industry. However, the glitter of diamonds hides the harsh realities many of these workers face—low wages, erratic work conditions, and almost no social safety net. While Surat’s diamond workers have borne the brunt of this crisis, the impacts of the sanctions and war have rippled across the global diamond trade. India's diamond exports have experienced a steep decline, plummeting by 28% in the fiscal year 2024, and are projected to fall further, reaching their lowest levels in a decade. Luxury markets in the U.S. and Europe, traditionally strong buyers of diamonds, have also contracted as consumer spending patterns shift in response to economic uncertainties. Rising inflation has curbed discretionary spending , with more buyers focusing on essentials rather than luxury purchases. This trend has further depressed demand for polished diamonds, exacerbating the crisis for workers in Surat who depend on robust global sales. The price of rough diamonds has also skyrocketed due to supply shortages, making it harder for manufacturers to remain profitable. Factories in Surat and other diamond hubs have had to make tough decisions—either lay off workers or shut down altogether. A Helpless Union and Government Neglect As the number of suicides among diamond workers continues to rise, the local Diamond Workers Union has launched a helpline to provide emotional and financial support. Since its inception in July, the helpline number has received around 1800 distress calls. "We have saved lives," said Zilriya Rameshbhai, the president of the union, recounting how workers on the brink of suicide reached out for help. The union also provides temporary relief to struggling workers by paying school fees, supplying food, and helping them manage debt. Unfortunately, such measures are not enough to lift Vijaybhai and others like him out of financial distress. Despite its best efforts, the union is overwhelmed by demand and constrained by limited resources. “[The] union is doing what they can,” Vijaybhai said, “but we need the government to listen.” Many workers feel abandoned by the government, which has yet to meaningfully address the crisis. The Indian government, typically focused on bolstering exports to strengthen the economy, has done little to provide immediate relief to the struggling diamond sector, according to workers. Jayantibhai, who lives in Amroli, a suburb of Surat, is frustrated by the lack of response from the authorities. “They are dead silent. [PM] Modi considers Gujarat his home, but how can he not listen to our plight?” she asked bitterly. “We have tried contacting the party’s office, but nobody listens. We are just forgotten.” Other workers share this frustration. “The government isn’t talking about the diamond industry,” said Deepak. “If they were, we wouldn’t be in this mess. Workers are roaming around without jobs, and nobody is doing anything.” Government inaction has intensified feelings of helplessness among diamond workers. Ramesh Bhai, the president of the local union, stated that they have repeatedly requested an economic relief package to support both the industry and its employees, but their appeals have gone unanswered. “There is no support from the government,” he said. “All the workers have been left on their own. Nobody cares how much we have contributed to the growth of the state and country’s economy.” He also mentioned the union's proposal to establish a special board including workers, factory owners, and government representatives to address the industry's challenges, but there has been no progress on that front either. With no relief in sight, the future of Surat’s diamond industry remains uncertain. While some workers hope for improvement, others are less optimistic. “There is no guarantee that the diamond industry will see growth again,” said Deepak. “We are all just waiting and watching, but we don’t know what will happen. The future seems bleak.” For workers like Roshan, who lost his father to the industry’s collapse, the pain is still raw. Yet, he remains determined to stay in Surat, the city he has called home for over 20 years. “Everything is here,” he said. “After what happened to my father, I just hope that things get better.”∎ ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: AUTHOR Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 AUTHOR Heading 5 Trupti Patel Indian Landscape (2019) Terracruda, 29 Earth Pigments of 29 Political States of India, New Delhi Ash, Acrylic medium and Gold Leaf on Fabriano paper. SHARE Facebook ↗ Twitter ↗ LinkedIn ↗ Reportage Surat Gujarat India Diamond Trade Russia-Ukraine Conflict War Trade Route Working Class Labour Rights Banned Raw Materials Mental Health Suicide Layoffs G7 European Union Sanctions Unemployment Epidemic Global Crisis Supply Chain Luxury Market Consumer Spending Diamond Workers Union Trade Unions Government Neglect Inaction Economic Security Narendra Modi Industrialization Health Crisis HANAN ZAFFAR is an award-winning media practitioner and documentary filmmaker based out of South Asia. He teaches storytelling at OP Jindal Global University. DANISH PANDIT is a multimedia journalist based in New Delhi. He covers politics, human rights and environment. Reportage Surat 2nd Apr 2025 TRUPTI PATEL was born in Nairobi and studied sculpture in India at MSU Vadodara and in the UK as a Charles Wallace Scholar to the Royal College of Art. Patel works predominantly in clay, often using Indian terracotta, which is rich red when fired. Her sensuous and sensitive ceramic sculptures regularly depict the female form and question the role of women in contemporary society. Most recently, she participated in the India Art Fair 2025, New Delhi, with Project 88 Gallery, Mumbai, and was the artist-in-residence at the Clayarch Gimhae Museum in South Korea. On That Note: Heading 5 23rd OCT Heading 5 23rd Oct Heading 5 23rd Oct