ASSOCIATE Vrinda Jagota VRINDA JAGOTA is a writer, union organizer, and social media manager based in Brooklyn. She currently contributes to Third Bridge Creative , organizes with Newsguild , and works with Naya Beat, previously at Pitchfork . ASSOCIATE WEBSITE INSTAGRAM TWITTER Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 LOAD MORE

Musician Ali Sethi in conversation with Associate Editor Kamil Ahsan COMMUNITY Syncretism & the Contemporary Ghazal AUTHOR AUTHOR AUTHOR Musician Ali Sethi in conversation with Associate Editor Kamil Ahsan SHARE Facebook ↗ Twitter ↗ LinkedIn ↗ ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: AUTHOR Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 AUTHOR Heading 5 Interview Music Ghazal Art History Historicity Syncretism State Repression Faiz Ahmed Faiz Khabar-e-Tahayyar-e-Ishq Siraj Aurangabadi Mah Laqa Bai Sensuality Metaphor Cultural Repression Art Practice Sound Poetic Form Performance Art Grief Raaga 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. DISPATCH Interview Music 14th Oct 2020 The Ghazal originated in Arabia in the 8th century. That's the funny stuff right? That in order to retrieve legitimate cosmopolitanism, we have to go back to a medieval multicultural moment. 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 Next Up:

Vast amounts of disinformation have emerged in Manipur amidst the current crisis. This is not solely because of the internet ban, but also its unequal use: privileging access to businesses and media close to power for nationalist ends, mostly in the valley. FEATURES Chokepoint Manipur Vast amounts of disinformation have emerged in Manipur amidst the current crisis. This is not solely because of the internet ban, but also its unequal use: privileging access to businesses and media close to power for nationalist ends, mostly in the valley. VOL. 2 ISSUE 1 REPORTAGE AUTHOR AUTHOR AUTHOR Courtesy of Sadiq Naqvi, from Kangpokpi, Manipur. ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: AUTHOR Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 AUTHOR Heading 5 Courtesy of Sadiq Naqvi, from Kangpokpi, Manipur. SHARE Facebook ↗ Twitter ↗ LinkedIn ↗ Reportage Manipur 3rd Oct 2023 Reportage Manipur State & Media Technology & Majoritarianism Tribal Conflict Kuki-Zo Meitei Indigeneity Scheduled Tribes Politics of Ethnic Identity Constitutional Recognition Social Media Disinformation Internet Crackdowns Media Landscape Internet Blackouts Kangpokpi Unverified Information Gender Violence Newsclick The Print Imphal The Guardian Deccan Herald India Today Nikkei Asia Meitei Leepun Churachandpur RSS Viral Clips Twitter Narratives State Government Narrative Majoritarianism Indigeneous Spaces Politics of Indigeneity Ethnically Divided Politics AFSPA Sister States Modi Meitei Peoples Local vs. National Politics Caste Tribes Northeast India 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. On the morning of July 19, 2023, my phone kept alerting me to WhatsApp messages, as it had done during the previous three months following the eruption of violence along ethnic lines in India’s northeastern state of Manipur. This time was different. It was a video accompanied by the following message: “If your blood doesn’t boil seeing this barbaric and inhuman treatment of fellow human being by Meitei goons, your conscious [sic] is equally morally dead. Period.” Before I could open it, other messages started pouring in, asking if I had watched the video. Others warned against circulating it over social media and messaging apps. Meanwhile, the 26-second clip of two women being paraded naked on the streets by a mob of men—groping and molesting the two while walking through paddy fields—had already gone viral. The incident recorded in the clip, however, was over two months old. On May 3, after the state’s highest court recommended that Manipur’s dominant Meitei community be included among the country’s Scheduled Tribe—a constitutional list that guarantees affirmative action for those included—the state’s hill tribe groups carried out mass rallies in protest. The same day, an attempted arson of a Kuki war memorial and the fire set on Meitei villages by unidentified individuals led to state-wide clashes between the Meiteis and the Kuki-Zo tribes. The two women, belonging to the Vaiphei community that is part of the larger umbrella of Kuki-Zo tribes of the Northeast, were assaulted by the street mob a day later. In some ways, these conflicts in Manipur demonstrate the Indian republic’s complicated politics of ethnic identity and claims for constitutional protection. Demands for affirmative action by regionally dominant groups is not unusual in India, as seen with the Pateldars in Gujarat, Marathas in Maharashtra, and, more recently, the Pahadis in Jammu and Kashmir. With regards to the Meiteis, who converted to Hinduism in the 18th century, its socially weaker sections already had access to the constitutionally defined Scheduled Castes, Other Backward Classes, and Economically Weaker Sections. These categories enable access to affirmative action as well as select government grants and scholarships. The demand to also be included among the Scheduled Tribes was initially a fringe cause within the Meiteis, with the Hindu Brahmins (the priestly caste at the top of the Hindu caste pyramid) of that community least open to the idea of being degraded to the status of a ‘Hao’ (tribal people). However, the project gained steam with the revival of the indigenous Meitei faith Sanamahism in the last few decades. The return to their indigenous roots has emboldened their belief that they were short-changed by the government, which didn’t recognize them as a ‘tribe' after Manipur was annexed by the Indian Union in 1949. The crisis has been further compounded by internet restrictions in place since May 4. Far from the state government’s stated intention to control “the spread of disinformation and false rumours through various social media platforms,” lack of access to the internet has resulted in a flood of fake news and rampant disinformation, where genuine footage documenting violence has often been depicted as ‘fake’, and where unverified rumors have been deployed to instigate sexual violence. In a civil conflict where the state government has unabashedly shown its loyalty to the majority ethnic community and the federal government has maintained the status quo, both physical carnage and the information wars are far from even-keeled. In this, Manipur has proved to be another troubling illustration of the Indian authorities’ habit of curbing internet access in regions seeing widespread conflict, where a choked information ecosystem has helped the powerful and hurt the politically weaker sections facing majoritarian violence. Background of the May violence In the months leading up to the May violence, a concerted campaign was already being led by Manipur’s Chief Minister Biren Singh, who hails from the ruling Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), against the minority Kuki-Zo tribes, who were peddled as the key culprits of the underground drug industry and portrayed as ‘illegal immigrants’ from neighboring Myanmar. Although the Kuki-Zo tribes make up only 16 percent of the population, Singh had been stoking majoritarian Meitei sentiments of the tribes’ “sudden” decadal growth, particularly in the wake of the refugee crisis from coup-hit Myanmar, with no recent census data to back it up. This is despite the neighboring state of Mizoram, where the dominant population has stronger ethnic ties to the Chin refugees, bearing a much greater brunt of the refugee population. In light of the Meitei’s dominant demographics (they are over 50 percent of Manipur’s population) compared to their relatively smaller territorial spread (they occupy roughly 10 percent of the state that is in the valley), the chief minister preyed on the community’s insecurity over limited resources and supremacist notions of cultural superiority. By all accounts, viral, unverified social media messages and rumors of Meiteis being beaten, killed and raped in the Churachandpur hill district in part triggered the attacks in the valley. Subsequently, civilians, senior government officials, politicians, and judges belonging to the Kuki-Zo tribes from the valley were targeted. This led to retaliatory attacks on the Meiteis in the hill districts, although in much smaller numbers compared to officials and families from the tribes in the valley. Internet connections across the state of Manipur were switched off a day after violence broke out, which has killed more than 180 people thus far—with casualties growing by the weeks—and displaced more than 70,000 from their homes and localities, reducing them to ghost towns. A police complaint filed on May 18 in response to the public assault against the two women furnishes some details about the incident. An armed mob of up to a thousand persons belonging to Meitei youth organizations entered the B.Phainom village in the hill tribal district of Kangpokpi, where they vandalized and looted personal property. Seeking to escape the violence of the mob, five residents of the village, including the two women, fled to the forests; they were later rescued by the state police, only to be apprehended by the same mob that snatched them from police custody. “All the three women were physically forced to remove their clothes and were stripped naked in front of the mob,” the complaint noted, adding that “the younger brother who tried to defend his sister’s modesty and life was murdered by members of the mob on the spot.” Even before the video of the attack on the two women in Kangpokpi appeared on social media, the incident had been reported by two online news portals—on June 1 by, Newsclick , and on July 12 by The Print —as part of the coverage of the sexual assaults during the Manipur violence. However, it was finally the graphic video that brought national attention to the state like it hadn’t in the last three months. Kaybie Chongloi, a Kuki journalist based in Kangpokpi District where the incident took place, told me that no one knew of the existence of the video until the previous day when a driver noticed Meitei men watching it on their phones. “He had asked them to share the video via Bluetooth, and that’s how we got to see it for the first time,” said Chongloi. By the next morning, he added, the video had been widely shared across WhatsApp and social media platforms. It also compelled Prime Minister Narendra Modi to finally break his silence on Manipur, almost three months after the violence, calling the crime “an insult to the entire country.” Skewed media landscape Since the outbreak of violence in early May, a steady stream of photo and video footage has appeared on social media, showing private residences and villages being burned down, even capturing the collusion of state police in these incidents. Meanwhile, pieces of disinformation have been shared by verified Twitter handles of socially influential figures with global platforms. This includes, for example, Licipriya Kangujam, a young climate influencer managed by her alleged ‘con man’ father , and Binalakshmi Nepram, a women’s rights activist and recent scholar-at-residence at Harvard University. On May 4, soon after the violence started, Kangujam shared the video of a burning residence saying “illegal immigrants are burning the houses of our Meitei indigenous community in Manipur”. Hours earlier, however, Tonsing S, a Kuki-Zo scholar at Michigan University, had already shared the same video, showing a Kuki-Zo residential locality in the state capital of Imphal, from where his family had recently been displaced. Kangujam has also shared videos showing disruption and mayhem, which she squarely blamed on ‘illegal immigrant’ and ‘poppy cultivating’ Kukis. Meanwhile, although seen advocating for peace on national television, Nepram has also been culpable in spreading misinformation, with a clear prejudice against the Kuki-Zo tribal groups. This includes sharing fake news on landmines allegedly placed by an armed group in a Manipur village, despite the information being debunked as false (reverse-image lookup found that the photos used in the story were from Jammu and Kashmir). She has not yet removed the tweet. More generally, Meitei-owned outlets and journalists from the community, who dominate the media landscape in the state, have been accused of being compromised , heavily toeing the state line, which is against the Kuki-Zo tribes. Apart from the accounts of these well-known personalities, several blue check-marked accounts have surfaced on Twitter since May, thanks to Elon Musk’s new policy on paid accounts which abandons its previous verification process, which have furthered disinformation campaigns. Take, for instance, a right-leaning website with the twitter handle @dintentdata that shot to limelight during the Manipur violence ostensibly as a “fact checker”. Its origins and ownership are unknown but the account has toed the Manipur state government’s narrative, as illustrated in a thread that called Kukis “illegals” migrating from Myanmar who had weaponized themselves to target the Meitei community. In the initial weeks, the running narrative on illegal immigrants and the Myanmar crisis dominated the coverage of the violence in mainstream Indian media outlets like Deccan Herald and India Today as well as in international publications like The Diplomat and the Washington Post . Unequal internet ban As I reported for Nikkei Asia in July, vast amounts of disinformation have emerged from the Manipur crisis not only because of an internet ban but due to its uneven nature: it has offered privileged access to businesses and media close to power, mostly in the valley. Dedicated internet services remained selectively available to particular businesses in the valley and government offices, with the approval of the home department. Notably, in the midst of an internet ban, members of Manipur-based right-wing Meitei groups, such as Meitei Leepun and an armed militia, Arambai Tenggol, have been posting inflammatory hate speech on their social media accounts. “Refrain from creating chaos at Imphal, we can no longer attack them here,” announced Korounganba Khuman, the militant leader of Arambai Tenggol, on his Facebook account. Written in Meitei Lon, he added, “We have a plan, which you'll hear about in two days’ time. Let's work together on this. Let us fight with all our might for our land and identity.” No action from the state government has been initiated on such open invocations of violence against the Kuki-Zo communities. Meanwhile, Meitei Leepun’s founding leader Pramot Singh went on national television (in an interview with veteran journalist Karan Thapar in The Wire ), threatening to “blow away” the tribals from the hills. In the past, Singh has been associated with Akhil Bhartiya Vishwa Parishad, the student wing of the Hindu nationalist militant outfit Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). Both groups—Arambai Tenggol and Meitei Leepun—have been openly endorsed by Chief Minister Singh and Leishemba Sanajaoba, the titular king of Manipur and a member of the upper house of the parliament. On July 25, Manipur state authorities lifted the ban on broadband services while retaining several severe restrictions. This included blocking social media websites, virtual private network (VPN) services and WiFi hotspots, while allowing for the physical monitoring of subscribers by concerned officials. Those seeking to access the internet under these conditions were required to sign an undertaking agreeing to the enforced monitoring by officials. After nearly five months of ban, mobile internet access was resumed by the state government on September 23, only to be soon suspended for the next five days amid protests after photographs showing the allegedly deceased bodies of two missing Meitei students surfaced online. The state government confirmed their death in a statement, but their bodies remain missing at the time of the publication of this story. A marketing professional from Imphal Valley, who asked not to be identified, said that in the early days of the internet ban, people were resorting to all sorts of loopholes: machine SIM cards used for digital payment (apps like Paytm and Google Pay), Vodafone VPN ports, and international E-SIMs like Airalo . “People would use SIM cards bought from other states, since Vodafone sim cards sold out in Manipur very fast at a going rate of INR 2000,” he said, speaking from an undisclosed location in the Northeast that he and his family have moved to temporarily. The IT company where his wife works had put her on leave during the shutdown weeks and was threatening layoffs to employees who wouldn’t come online. Sources from the area told me that local broadband providers in both the hills and the valley did not comply with the government order to switch off internet services. SAAG has accessed a copy of a state-government order that notes the “misuse of additional connection on whitelisted/reactivated” internet lines and reports of “accessibility of internet facility” in the Kuki-majority Churachandpur area. No such order was issued against any centers in the valley, even though the government eventually put a curb on all these loopholes. For five years, India has been leading the global record for the highest number of Internet shutdowns in the world with at least 84 cases recorded in 2022 , far higher than the war-hit Ukraine, which saw 22 shutdowns imposed by the Russian military after their invasion of the country. According to Software Freedom Law Centre ’s internet shutdown tracker , India has seen a total of 759 shutdowns since 2012, with Jammu and Kashmir experiencing the majority of the bans, and Manipur featuring fourth on the list. In June, a joint report on internet shutdowns in India, released by Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Internet Freedom Foundation , a digital rights advocacy group in India, found that the Indian authorities’ decisions to disrupt internet access were “often erratic and unlawful”. The report cited a Parliamentary Standing Committee on Communications and Information Technology report that concluded, “So far, there is no proof to indicate that internet shutdown [sic] has been effective in addressing public emergency and ensuring public safety.” Meenakshi Ganguly, the HRW South Asia director, told me that while authorities have the responsibility to contain the spread of incitement to hate or violence, and to combat disinformation, simply denying internet access can end up further stoking fear and divisiveness. “Without access to credible information, internet shutdowns risk the spread of rumor-based retaliatory attacks, perpetuating the cycle of violence,” she said. Missing outrage The role of fake news and disinformation in instigating violence, including sexual assaults, against tribal women in Manipur has been well-documented . However, despite videos of these incidents floating online after the breakout of the violence, neither local nor national media reported on it or verified and pursued these leads. Several weeks before the infamous Kangpokpi video of the two women being paraded naked was out, another clip of a Kuki-Zo woman begging Meitei women to let go of her was doing the rounds. Speaking in Meitei Lon, the Meitei women are seen instigating men to rape 29-year-old Nancy Chingthianniang, who was later interviewed by the UK-based Guardian , a few weeks before her video went viral again. She lost her husband and mother-in-law to the mob. Chingthianniang herself was beaten black and blue until she passed out. Seeing the video of herself instantly triggered her. “I felt scared like I was back in that moment even though I was not raped,” she told me over the phone. When asked how she felt about these videos of herself and the women paraded being circulated online, Chingthianniang said it was for the better. “Hoi ka sa, eh; I'm glad that it’s out,” she said. “Now people know what these Meira Paibis (Meitei civic activists known as ‘women torchbearers’) really did to us.” While the public responses to the viral Kangpokpi video was welcomed by the Kuki-Zo community, especially as it led to the swift arrest of at least seven of the accused, the heinous crimes against the community have not seen similar reactions. On July 2, two weeks before the Kangpokpi video was released, photos and footage of a severed head perched on a fence went viral on WhatsApp groups, shocking members of the Kuki-Zo community. The head belonged to David Thiek, a resident of Langza village in the foothills of the Churachandpur tribal hill district. He had been defending his village on the day when an armed militia from the valley attacked it. Thiek’s head was severed off and his body burned down to ashes, the remains of which were draped in the traditional shawl of the Hmar tribe that he belonged to. A few days later, Sang Tonsing, a 24-year-old social worker from the Kuki-Zo community living outside Manipur, saw the screenshot of a photo posted by a Twitter account titled ‘Nongthombam Rohen Meetei’ (now deleted) with the caption, “Killing of meetei by kuki militants [sic]”. The photo showed a man, his face digitally obscured by red brush strokes, holding a machete in one hand and a severed head in another. A copy of the photo downloaded from Twitter shows a time stamp of 5.45 p.m. on July 2, 2023. Suspecting the severed head to belong to Thiek, Tonsing and a group of other social-media savvy friends attempted to verify the photo, beginning with reverse image verification on Google and TinEye. The photo appeared original. Tonsing then began scanning the local Meitei news channels, particularly Mami and Elite TV, since these channels had extensively covered the chief minister visiting the Meitei-dominated Bishnupur district in the valley, bordering the Kuki Zo villages that were attacked. That is when he noticed the same outfit as was worn by the man in the photo: a dark-teal-colored full-sleeved t-shirt paired with brown track pants and a camouflage tactical vest. “There was no way that another person could be wearing the same exact outfit,” he said. But that wasn’t their only lead. The person seen on the news clip, whose outfit matched with that of the assailant in the photograph, was eventually tracked on Facebook. He was identified as Mairembam Romesh Mangang, the public relations officer or the security detail of S Premchandra Singh, a Bharatiya Janata Party member of Manipur’s legislative assembly who represented the Kumbi constituency. Tonsing said that they instinctively thought to check the accounts of those associated with the MLA of Kumbi, since it was close to Langza village, where David was killed. “Secondly,” he added, “Kumbi is known to be a hotspot of Meitei insurgent groups where politicians conduct their financial dealings with underground groups.” The screenshot is now part of an investigation into the incident where members of the Arambai Tenggol and Meitei Leepun are among the accused. SAAG reached out to Premchandra Singh, the MLA of Kumbi, who did not respond to the request for comment. (This piece will be updated as and when he responds.) While Tonsing and his friends may have made a plausible case of identification, what remains unexplained is why that photo was leaked online. His guess is one of three scenarios: one, someone from one of the Meitei-run WhatsApp groups carelessly uploaded it; two, there may still be whistleblowers among the Meitei groups who want the truth out; and three, which he thinks most likely, is that this was an attempt to manipulate the narrative in their favor as victims rather than perpetrators of the crime. Either way, he’s certain that more videos would surface once the internet ban is fully lifted. “Nowadays everyone’s got a smartphone and they are filming videos when they go to burn villages. Since these are mobs of 5000-odd people, they can’t control what people are shooting”, said Tonsing. Meanwhile in the valley, there have been news reports, albeit unverified, of missing Meitei individuals being tortured and killed in viral clips. In early July, hours after two cousins—27-year-old Irengbam Chinkheinganba and 31-year-old Sagolshem Ngaleiba Meitei from Kakching District—had gone missing, a video began circulating which showed two men being slapped and kicked, before being shot from behind. A BBC report noted that another video showing the shooting of a man surfaced two months later. While neither of the videos has been independently verified, the families of the missing two have identified the two men in the videos as Chinkheinganba and Ngaleibav. Similarly, the parents of a young teenager , who went missing along with her friend near the hill district, have identified their daughter in a clip that showed a girl being beheaded, allegedly by Kuki assailants. However, when SAAG checked the video, the perpetrators were speaking in the Burmese tongue, and not any of the languages or dialects native to Manipur. Videos connected to both of these disappearances surfaced only after the clip of the naked Vaipehi women made headlines. In our post-truth era, the conflict is not limited to violence in the buffer zones, but is also a war of perceptions on social media where fake news, morphed footage, and decontextualized information often seek to compound the confusion. Majoritarian manipulation Manipur is a state now divided like never before. Ethnic fault lines have always run deep, sometimes deeper and thicker than bloodlines despite enough instances of intermarriage between communities. The murder of a 7-year-old Kuki boy in early June, alongside his mother and his maternal aunt, en route to a hospital through the valley is emblematic of this. Even though the boy’s mother and maternal aunt belonged to the Meitei community, the mob made up of Meira Paibis and other Meiteis did not spare them and set the ambulance on fire after the murders. Local media operating out of Imphal and dominated by journalists from the Meitei community —or owned by politicians of the same community—did not report this incident, just as they ignored several other stories like the seven rape cases registered to date . Forget the tyranny of distance between New Delhi-based national media and Manipur, newsrooms based in the valley often don’t go and cover neighboring hill districts. In the present crisis, where Manipur’s Chief Minister Singh stands accused of orchestrating the violence against the Kuki-Zo community, with the majority-controlled media not covering the hills, and given only a partial lift on the internet blackout, the scales are tipped heavily against the minority tribes. In early September, in a report on the media coverage of the violence, the Editors’ Guild of India lamented how the Manipur media had turned into “Meitei media” and held the internet ban responsible for the media being overly reliant on the state’s narrative. Shortly after, two police complaints under sections of defamation, promoting enmity, and criminal conspiracy were filed against members of the Guild’s fact-finding committee. Meanwhile, rather than working to gain the confidence of the Kuki-Zo communities as their political representative, we instead find the chief minister getting into a late-night spat on Twitter, asking a Kuki-identifying user if they are from Manipur or Myanmar. As violence continues unabated in the “ buffer zones ” between the hills and the valley, where both communities live in relative proximity, rumors and disinformation remain rampant on both sides. In the din of contrasting narratives laying the blame exclusively on the other side, Spearcorps , an official Indian Army account on Twitter, has emerged as a neutral line for updates on the clashes. After days of speculation over the women-led civil-society group Meira Paibis aiding armed rioters to attack tribal villages by creating road blockades, the Spearcorps posted a tweet noting that “Women activists in #Manipur are deliberately blocking routes and interfering in Operations of Security Forces.” The post went on to appeal to “all sections of population to support our endeavours in restoring peace.” This new normal is especially significant in a state that has a long history of confrontation with the Indian Army, which stands accused of many human-rights excesses through the application of a special martial law, the Armed Forces Special Powers Act. Naturally, the dominant Meitei community, its representative media and the state government see the army as biased in favor of the tribal groups, and accuse the armed forces of assisting Kuki "militants" . When I spoke to a source in the army who has been monitoring the security situation in Manipur, he argued that the neutrality of central security forces was evident in their assistance in the speedy evacuation of Meiteis from the hill districts. The only time that the local media had ever portrayed them in a positive light, he said, was when they reported the “rescue” of five Meitei civilians from Kuki “militants” (notably, Meitei attackers are often called ‘miscreants’ in these reports). “Except that it was the Kukis who had handed over the Meitei civilians to us in good faith,” he told me. But that detail never made it in any of the Meitei-run press. With such opportunities for solidarity that could have led to a ceasefire on violence and retaliatory attacks now looking increasingly remote, we find the strengthening of the Kuki-Zo tribes’ resolve to settle for separate administration away from the Manipur government. To be sure, the disturbing video of the Vaiphei women may have led to police action after weeks of inaction, and it has alerted the country and the world to the scale of violence. But on the home front, the civil war is nowhere near an end. In turn, it only fueled the war over narratives, where Manipuri social media was suddenly filled with posts asking Meitei women to come out with stories of their defilement. On August 9, the first police complaint of a Meitei woman alleging sexual assault was filed in the valley, in which the complainant said she was assaulted by “Kuki miscreants” on May 3, when Meitei houses in Churachandpur were being burned down. “The delay in filing this complaint is due to social stigma,” the complaint said. In the midst of all the suffering and counter narratives, Prime Minister Modi only took cognizance of the video, which he called “an insult to society,” while undermining the scale and context of the conflict in Manipur by equating it to violence in states like Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan. Despite the terrible cost that the two tribal women had to pay with their dignity for Modi—and the rest of India—to finally take notice and speak up, he maintained his position as a BJP star campaigner rather than the leader of a democracy. Apar Gupta, an advocate who founded Internet Freedom Foundation, was apologetic in his tone as many have been while talking to me about Manipur, which happens to be my home state. Beyond the scale of violence that the viral video alone has revealed and the sore lack of access to relief and medical aid for the internally displaced, he sharply questioned whose interest the internet ban had served. “I believe beyond this individual specific instance, the internet shutdown has served the function of contouring our media national narrative,” said Gupta. “Manipur is burning, but we don't care.” ∎ 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

ARTIST Saniya Kamal SANIYA KAMAL is a writer and artist, currently and MFA student in Fiction at Brown University. ARTIST WEBSITE INSTAGRAM TWITTER Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 LOAD MORE

Cambodia’s trade union leaders, alongside young environmentalists fighting to preserve the country’s environment, have been imprisoned and censored for demanding just ecological policies and labor conditions. As the Cambodian monarchy continues to harpoon advocates with falsified charges ranging from conspiracy to “disbelieving a court decision,” movement leaders continue to demonstrate, knowing the people’s struggle for personal and environmental dignity transcends the carceral means of the state. · THE VERTICAL Reportage · Phnom Penh Cambodia’s trade union leaders, alongside young environmentalists fighting to preserve the country’s environment, have been imprisoned and censored for demanding just ecological policies and labor conditions. As the Cambodian monarchy continues to harpoon advocates with falsified charges ranging from conspiracy to “disbelieving a court decision,” movement leaders continue to demonstrate, knowing the people’s struggle for personal and environmental dignity transcends the carceral means of the state. Sophie Neak, Hang On, no.18 (2015). C-print photograph. Paean to Mother Nature In Cambodia, activists are facing a crackdown on their fundamental rights, including freedom of expression, association, and peaceful assembly. The state is particularly targeting those advocating for environmental and labor rights, and as civil society space continues to shrink and tolerance for dissent wanes, the government is increasingly resorting to arrests to silence perceived opposition. “We have fallen deeply in love with nature, and we don’t want it to be destroyed by corruption. People’s livelihoods depend on natural resources, and they don’t want to lose their land, their home, their culture. We understand them, we feel the pain, so we want to protect them. Our lives are inspired by nature, and that motivates us to take the risk of standing here.” These are the words of a young activist from Mother Nature Cambodia , a youth-led environmental rights organization that launched in 2012. He requested to remain anonymous due to fear of reprisal. Since the organization’s launch, its members have campaigned on a raft of environmental issues in Cambodia, leading to multiple arrests, members being jailed, and authorities attempting to silence their voices. In July 2024, 10 young Cambodians were sentenced to between six and eight years in prison, convicted on charges of plotting against the government and insulting the king. Three of them, including Spanish co-founder Alejandro Gonzalez-Davidson , who was deported for his environmental activism in 2015 and permanently banned from re-entering Cambodia, were sentenced to eight years in jail and fined USD2,500. The others were handed six-year terms. Five, including Gonzalez-Davidson, were sentenced in absentia. Ahead of the verdict at Phnom Penh Court of First Instance, 26-year-old Long Kunthea, who has already been imprisoned for her activism, told a group of supporters who had gathered around her that she would not be silenced, encouraging her peers to remain undeterred. “May you all not be hopeless but continue your work in protecting the environment, your rights, your land. Although we are in jail, we will be strong. They can only arrest our bodies, but they cannot arrest our will and conscience,” she said. The sentencing has been condemned by various international organizations, who are lobbying for the release of those imprisoned. “The verdict is devastating for the 10 activists, who face between six to eight years in prison for their efforts to protect Cambodia’s environment,” said Bryony Lau, the Deputy Director for Asia of Human Rights Watch, in a statement in 2024. “It also sends an appalling message to Cambodia’s youth that the government will side with special interests over the environment every chance it gets.” Amnesty International’s Deputy Regional Director for Research, Montse Ferrer, said in a statement that the convictions were “another crushing blow to Cambodia’s civil society,” adding, “Mother Nature Cambodia is a renowned activist group that has brought attention to environmental degradation fuelled by long-standing corruption in the country. “Instead of listening to young leaders at the forefront of the environmental movement, the Cambodian government has chosen to jail those that dare to speak out. The government has shown time and time again that it will not tolerate any dissent.” Attempts to silence the defenders Since 2012, Mother Nature Cambodia has lobbied on environmental issues from illegal sand dredging and lake-infilling to pollution and protesting against mega hydropower dam projects. The organization has successfully campaigned to halt the Chinese-led construction of a mass hydropower dam in Areng Valley in southwest Cambodia, that threatened the Indigenous community, as well as the delicate ecosystem of the area. Mother Nature Cambodia also played an instrumental role in ending illegal sand dredging operations in Koh Kong. Mother Nature’s philosophy has resonated strongly with Cambodian youth keen to protect the environment for future generations. The environmental defenders, however, have also repeatedly been targeted by authorities. “The main environmental issue is the corruption in the systems, and these diseases are getting harder to solve because environmental crimes are happening all over the country under development projects,” a member of Mother Nature anonymously told SAAG. However, the arrests and intimidation have failed to dampen spirits, instead fuelling members’ determination to continue their mission. “We must empower and mobilize youth in the country to speak up. They must speak up against repression as we continuously demand an end to devastating actions against nature. We stay focused, resilient and innovative,” he said. “People’s voices are needed to lobby the government to give our friends back their freedom. We won’t stay silent if our friends are still not free. We, Mother Nature Cambodia, are demanding power for the people, not the regime.” In September 2023, Mother Nature Cambodia became the first Cambodian organization to win Sweden’s Right Livelihood award for its “fearless and engaging activism to preserve Cambodia’s natural environment in the context of a highly restricted democratic space.” Fighting for the disappearing rights of workers It’s not only environmental activists whose voices are in danger of being silenced. Recent years have seen a targeting of Cambodia’s union leaders, who have been peacefully advocating for workers’ rights amid claims of human rights abuses, unfair dismissals and wages, and mass layoffs. On September 16, trade union leader Chhim Sithar, 37, was released after serving two years in Prey Sar, a notorious prison on the outskirts of Phnom Penh. Sithar is the head of the Labour Rights Supported Union of Khmer Employees (LRSU) and was charged with incitement to commit a felony. Sithar led a year-long series of peaceful protests that started in December 2021 against the mass layoff of 1,329 employees at NagaWorld—a casino giant in Phnom Penh—during the pandemic. Hundreds of workers took to the streets outside the casino in protest of the dismissals, with LRSU demanding 365 union members be reinstated and that all those who lost their jobs receive fair compensation from the Malaysian-owned casino. In May 2023, Sithar was sentenced to two years behind bars (having already served almost two years), for incitement to commit a felony, while eight other union members were handed lesser suspended sentences or monitoring orders. “They were convicted for simply exercising their rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and association, protected by both the Cambodian Constitution and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights ratified by Cambodia in 1992,” UN Human Rights Office spokesperson Jeremy Laurence said in a statement . “The rights to peaceful assembly and association include the right to hold meetings, sit-ins and strikes, and the right of individuals to interact and organize among themselves to collectively express, promote, pursue, and defend common interests.” Cambodian authorities have maintained that citizens have the right to exercise freedom of speech and hold peaceful gatherings, as stated in the law, and arrests are only made when laws are broken. Khleang Soben, LRSU Secretary General, joined 70 Cambodian civil society organizations and many international organizations, including Amnesty International, HRW, and the US Department of State, in lobbying for Sithar’s release while she was in prison. “Until now, I’m curious about why she was detained as this is a labor dispute between workers and the company,” she told me. “But they accuse worker representatives of inciting social chaos. For me, it’s too much and unexpected that they turn the victim into the perpetrator. It’s very unfair.” In April 2024, Sithar’s “fight for democracy and respect for human rights” earned her the Swedish government’s annual Per Anger Prize, which celebrates courage, capacity to act and engagement. “She is a vital source of support for Cambodian women who are forced to work under appalling conditions. They are demanding to have their voices heard and their rights respected at their places of work,” the judges said. Sithar’s case is one of a series of targeted attacks by authorities. Despite this, Soben remains determined to ensure Sithar’s voice is not silenced, and pledged to continue the fight for the rights of her members. “Recently, we’ve seen the arrest of many youth and union activists. Saying I’m not afraid isn’t completely true. But I won’t give up as it’s a valuable job that benefits many Cambodians,” she said. “Union work is undervalued and it is unsafe when we stand up for workers and refuse to undertake activities that exploit the labor force and workers' interests. We will continue our nonviolent demands until there is a solution. Even if I am scared, it won't stop me.” Yang Sophorn, President of the 16,000-member strong Cambodia Alliance of Trade Union (CATU), also came under fire during the NagaWorld protests. On 4 August 2022, authorities accused her of conducting illegal activities and threatened her with an unspecified punishment for supporting the ongoing strikes. “We know that when we work in this field, there are a lot of people who are not happy with us, but we still do it for the sake of our members and to fight for their rights. The reason we continue this work is because of love, passion and wanting to help people in need,” she said. “It’s an injustice” “I’ve had violence committed against me and been arrested many times, but I still take on the challenge because I work for the rights of people. I’m not involved with politics, only labor rights. I suffer and have a lot of pressure to stop, but I have no choice. I have to promote the rights of workers,” Ath Thorn told SAAG. The former president of the Cambodian Labour Confederation (CLC) , a role he served for 18 years until May, and president of the Coalition of Cambodian Apparel Workers Democratic Union (CCAWDU) , Thorn has spent the majority of his working life fighting for the rights of garment factory workers. He launched CCAWDU in 1997 while working in a factory, in response to the unfair treatment he witnessed from his employer. “I saw and experienced a lot of labor abuse, violations and cheating on the ground. There was nobody to respond to these problems. So, I established the trade union to address the challenges and negotiate with the employer.” During his time serving as union leader, however, he has been the victim of multiple legal actions and arrests, violence, threats, and intimidation. “As an independent, democratic trade union, we work to promote workers’ interests and benefits, and the authorities and companies abuse us,” he said. “Some of us are arrested and charged, violated and discriminated against, beaten and dismissed without pay. So, there are a lot of cases against us, and a lot of pressure and challenges.” A 2022 HRW report, ‘ Only “Instant Noodle” Unions Survive: Union Busting in Cambodia’s Garment and Tourism Sectors , based on interviews conducted between March and June 2022, found “widespread violations of workers’ rights to register, form and join independent unions at garment factories, a casino and other places of business.” On May 7, Mam Rithy, Vice President of CLC, became one of the latest voices to be silenced when he was detained after Phnom Penh Municipal Court convicted him for “inciting to commit a crime” and “disbelieving a court decision”. The charge against the well-known advocate for the labor rights of Cambodian factory workers was in relation to a video he posted on Facebook on February 24, 2022 commenting on the arrest of a female union leader in Sihanoukville in relation to a Chinese casino. The 35-year-old was handed a 1.5 year prison sentence and a two million riel (USD480) fine. “Vuthy has now been in jail more than four months and did not expect to be detained for long. It’s really tough for him and an injustice,” Thorn said. While the threats to these activists remain real, it has only served to strengthen their fight. “The arrests only make people get mad at the violent injustice to innocent people without any sense,” a Mother Nature member stated. “We have to strengthen our mental health and capacity-building to keep inspiring more people to become defenders. The more they arrest our members, the more defenders rise up. We will always be here, fighting for environmental justice.”∎ SUB-HEAD Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Reportage Phnom Penh Climate Cambodia Mother Nature Unions Environmental Science Environmentalist Youth Youth Protest Censorship Ecology Labor Policy Movements Climate Security Community Security Freedom Free Speech Labor Rights Civil Society Civilian Activism Corruption Natural Resources Mother Nature Cambodia Anonymity Imprisonment Alejandro Gonzalez-Davidson Deportation Banned Phnom Penh Court of First Instance Hope Political Will Human Rights Watch Amnesty International Dissent Hydropower Dam Hydropolitics Areng Valley Indigenous Spaces Ecosystem Koh Kong Future Generations Empowerment Silence Disappearance Worker Rights Prey Sar Labour Rights Supported Union Khmer Employees Peaceful Protest Monitoring Victimization Targeted Attack State Government Narrative Cambodia Alliance of Trade Union CATU NagaWorld Protests Injustice Violence Political Violence Cambodian Labour Confederation CLC Coalition of Cambodian Apparel Workers Democratic Union CCAWDU Garment Factory Labor Abuse Arrest Threats Intimidation Union Busting Capacity-building Environmental Justice 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. 25th 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:

JOURNALIST Gaiutra Bahadur Gaiutra Bahadur is an essayist, critic, and journalist. She is the author of Coolie Woman: The Odyssey of Indenture , which was shortlisted in 2014 for the Orwell Prize, the British literary prize for artful political writing. Her work has appeared in the New York Times Book Review, New York Review of Books, The New Republic, The Guardian, The Nation, The Virginia Quarterly Review, Lapham’s Quarterly, Dissent, The Boston Review, The Los Angeles Review of Books, Ms. Magazine, Foreign Policy, The Washington Post and The Griffith Review . She is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Arts, Culture, and Media at Rutgers University in Newark. JOURNALIST WEBSITE INSTAGRAM TWITTER Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 LOAD MORE

WRITER-ILLUSTRATOR Vashti Harrison VASHTI HARRISON is an NYT-bestselling author, illustrator, and filmmaker, originally from Onley, Virginia. She has a background in cinematography and screenwriting and a love for storytelling. She is the author and illustrator of the best-selling middle grade series Little Leaders , Little Dreamers , Little Legend s, the illustrator of the best-selling picture books Hair Love by Matthew Cherry, Sulwe by Lupita Nyong’o, which received a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor. Her latest children's book Big will be published by Little, Brown in May 2023. Vashti is a two-time recipient of the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work for Children. Her experimental films have shown around the world at film festivals and venues including the New York Film Festival , Rotterdam International Film Festival and Edinburgh International Film Festival . WRITER-ILLUSTRATOR WEBSITE INSTAGRAM TWITTER Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 Heading 5 Heading 6 Heading 6 LOAD MORE

An ambitious collaboration between Dhivehi visual and performance artists, experimental and folk musicians, typographers, and people from the many atolls of the Maldives creating vital cultural spaces in Malé—one that sheds light on how Maldivian artists use unified and disparate aesthetics to reflect on class, space, and politics. BOOKS & ARTS A Dhivehi Artists Showcase AUTHOR AUTHOR AUTHOR An ambitious collaboration between Dhivehi visual and performance artists, experimental and folk musicians, typographers, and people from the many atolls of the Maldives creating vital cultural spaces in Malé—one that sheds light on how Maldivian artists use unified and disparate aesthetics to reflect on class, space, and politics. SHARE Facebook ↗ Twitter ↗ LinkedIn ↗ ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: AUTHOR Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 AUTHOR Heading 5 Exhibition Maldives Art Practice Internationalist Perspective Art Activism Indigenous Art Practice Oceans Islands Luxury Tourism Malé Painting Dhivehi Typography Fine Art Experimental Music Folk Music Music Video Performance Art Dance Repertory Dance Troupe Art Institutions Gatekeeping In Grief In Solidarity Curation Aesthetics Missing Aesthetics Hip Hop Un’dhun Urban/Rural Fuamulah Huvadu atoll Rasmadhoo Kulhudufushi Seascapes Class Struggle Environment Atolls 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. DISPATCH Exhibition Maldives 5th Jun 2021 For our event In Grief, In Solidarity on 5th June 2021, we featured the most ambitious collaboration SAAG has attempted to date, with over 20 Maldivian performance artists, visual artists, musicians, typographers, artist collectives, and poets in a wide-ranging showcase on a range of Dhivehi art. Curated by Kareen Adam and Associate Editor Nazish Chunara, the showcase was meant to glimpse the art practices in an overlooked country and demonstrate the perspectives one misses as a consequence of overlooking whole communities and peoples. It is a paradigmatic problem for the international Left: Why do we so often take borders for granted in practice, even if we fervently do not wish to in principle? The showcase also provides a counterpoint to what people often associate with Maldivian: as merely an exclusionary, elite haven for tourists. The music and poetry are intentionally not subtitled, as SAAG, the magazine, shifts into multilingual presentation. We hope to strike against the expectation that population size should dictate such expectations and consider Dhivehi aesthetics and politics on their terms. Artists and collectives featured include Afzal Shaafiu, Aishath Huda, Beatz Crew, Cartman Ayya, DIONYSIAC , Eagan Badeeu, Firushana Naseem, Little Faratas N’ Monkey, Mohamed Ikram, Mariyam Omar, Mary Halym, Meyna Hassaan, Nadee Rachey, Nashiu Zahir, Nur Danya, Raya Ali a.k.a. Echnoid, Symbolic Records , and Yazan. 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 Next Up:

Kashmiri homes and livelihoods are disintegrating, with major infrastructural developments and mining projects inducing landslides, disrupting water and electrical channels, and destroying agricultural trade in the region–all in the name of increasing Kashmir's connectivity. Impractical in scope, these infrastructural projects defy all recommendations geological researchers have urged developers to consider for decades: and the government is content leaving Kashmiris in unlivable conditions, so long as the homes are not yet one with the earth. Kashmiri homes and livelihoods are disintegrating, with major infrastructural developments and mining projects inducing landslides, disrupting water and electrical channels, and destroying agricultural trade in the region–all in the name of increasing Kashmir's connectivity. Impractical in scope, these infrastructural projects defy all recommendations geological researchers have urged developers to consider for decades: and the government is content leaving Kashmiris in unlivable conditions, so long as the homes are not yet one with the earth. Asif in front of the ruins of his home (2024). Photograph courtesy of the authors. Artist Ramban Tauseef Ahmad · Mohammad Aatif Ammad Kanth 2 Dec 2024 nd · THE VERTICAL REPORTAGE · LOCATION Cracks in Pernote When Aasif Katoch returned home from work in the evening of April 25, he heard a loud voice from his cousin’s house, just over 100 metres away. “They were calling us urgently,” he recalled. “When we arrived, we saw cracks had developed in their house.” But before Katoch could begin to do anything about it, his children began frantically calling out to him from his house. He rushed back, only to see cracks starting to appear there too. “Within minutes,” he said, recounting the scenes of his house sinking, “we watched in horror as our homes which we built with hard work were damaged in front of our own eyes.” Katoch’s family isn‘t alone. Pernote village, seven kilometres from Ramban district in Jammu and Kashmir, became a disaster zone in April when 28 houses, including Katoch’s, were destroyed completely by land subsidence, affecting around 500 people . The road linking to Pernote village was severely damaged, cutting off connectivity. Cracks stretched several kilometres, disrupted electricity and water supply, adding more difficulties to the affected residents. Unmitigated Development is to Blame Since 2010, there has been an unprecedented rise in land sinking incidents near the national highway and railway tracks in Kashmir. Many attribute this increase to the rise in large-scale developmental projects , such as railway construction , widening of roads like the National highway , which links Ramban with Banihal, tunnel digging in the mountains , and hydro power projects, all constructed without proper precautions. For instance, around 12 hydropower projects are either constructed or are under construction in the Chenab region of Jammu. “One of the main causes of the increasing landslides in the region is unregulated developmental activity,” G.M Bhat, a Kashmir-based geologist, explained to us. “While landslides due to natural conditions existed before, human activities like mining have accelerated the frequency and severity of these incidents. The fragile nature of these mountains demands careful handling, yet we are doing the exact opposite.” For Bhat, the collapse of an 800-metre tunnel in Ramban on 19 May 2022, in which ten people died, should raise serious concerns. Recent land sinkings, like those in Pernote , he reasoned, are clearly the result of human activities, specifically poorly planned developmental projects. “We have been raising these issues for the last 30 years,” Bhat said, “with reports filed repeatedly. I can’t understand why the government continues to ignore our warnings.” The portion of a road in Pernote damaged after land subsidence. Courtesy of the authors. He blamed authorities for not involving experts and ignoring their warnings before starting work, saying the region has now become vulnerable to disasters due to excessive constructions. The residents also blame the construction agencies for land sinkage. “Since we live in a hilly area, rainwater used to flow naturally through canals and streams, eventually reaching the river at the bottom of the hill,” said Akther, a local resident of Ramban. Moreover, he added, during the extensive drilling for the national highway and tunnels, agency workers dumped tunnel waste near Chenab river banks, blocking these natural water channels. Despite raising concerns with the authorities, the residents were ignored. “As the waste blocked the streams,” Akther shared, “water began accumulating, saturating the land, making it unstable and unable to bear the weight of the mountain, which led to the sinking.” The situation worsened with the frequent blasts carried out during tunnel construction. The explosions were so loud that residents’ houses would shake, resembling powerful earthquakes. “We often rushed outside in fear that our homes might collapse,” Akther said. “The blasts were terrifying, and our children were left crying, traumatised by the repeated tremors.” In response to these concerns, the residents wrote to the District Magistrate (DM) in 2014, 2022, and 2023, highlighting that the Border Roads Organisation (BRO) was violating environmental norms by improperly dumping waste, blocking canals, and having a poor drainage system. Despite assurances of action from the DM, no visible steps have been taken. Now, the residents are taking the matter to court. “We feel neglected and unheard,” Akther expressed. “We want the authorities to fully compensate us for our losses and provide immediate rehabilitation, but they continue to ignore us.” Why is unprecedented development happening? Jammu and Kashmir has long been viewed as a region in need of better infrastructure. Poor road connectivity, especially in mountain areas like Pir Panjal and Chenab, has hindered trade and access to services for decades. Both these regions have undergone several development projects over the last decade, which includes tunnelling, road widening of NH 44 , construction of bridges, dams and railway lines to improve connectivity with the rest of India. For example, the new Katra-Banihal railway line and the widening of National highway 244 from two to four lanes is expected to be a game changer for the region's economy, as it will reduce travel time from Jammu to Srinagar and improve transportation for both locals and businesses. In 1999, Bhat explained that the local government invited a team of experts––including geologists, geographers, and landslide specialists from various countries––to Kashmir to study the Himalayas. “They warned that large-scale projects in the region would be extremely dangerous,” he said. A collapsed transmission tower damaged after land sinkage in Pernote. Courtesy of the authors. Since then, however, “massive developmental projects have been undertaken,” Bhat added, “with post-1999 projects being far larger in scale compared to those before that time.” According to Dr. D.P Kanungo, engineering geologist and landslide expert from Delhi, the “lithotectonic setup, rocks, and tectonics of the Pir Panjal range are extremely sensitive.” Any development in this region, therefore, must follow proper technical and scientific guidelines. “While I’m not opposed to development,” he clarified, “it’s clear that projects in the Pir Panjal region have not been carried out in a technically sound or scientific manner.” “Disrupting its fragile ecosystems can have fatal consequences,” Dr. Kanungo added, explaining why the excessive blasting for tunnelling is dangerous, particularly in these areas where the mountain range is young, still rising, and undergoing significant neo-tectonic activity. “When I visited the area, I saw that the work was being done in an unplanned way,” he noted. “Incidents like the land sinking in Pernote and cracks in nearby village homes could have been avoided.” The Detailed Project Report (DPR) outlines the scientific and technical methods to be followed, including when and how to support a cut slope. It also specifies where and how to cut particular rocks. However, our investigation revealed that the DPR is frequently violated and scientific techniques are often not followed on the ground, especially in the Himalayan regions. The Dangers of Improving Road Connectivity to Cut Travel Time The challenging terrains of the ecologically sensitive Chenab and Pir Panjal regions make travel difficult on the Jammu-Srinagar Highway, especially in the harsh winter months when snow and landslides frequently block the road. With the aim to decrease travel time on the Jammu-Srinagar Highway and increase connectivity to the Kashmir region, the government has spent almost 16000 crore INR to widen the two lane highway into four lanes. To date, 210 kilometres, including 10 tunnels, have been finished. The project, which will decrease travel time from 8 hours to 4-5 hours, is set for completion by 2025. Between 2010 and 2020, around 1750 people have died and more than 12,000 people have been injured in over 8,000 accidents on Jammu-Srinagar highway. “The construction of a four-lane highway on the Srinagar-Jammu route, in fragile areas, would be dangerous in coming years,” according to Bhat. “A two-lane road in sensitive zones, with four lanes only in the plains, would have been far more appropriate. Instead, we’ve made the mistake of widening roads and toe-cutting mountains, which has triggered land sinking.” As Raja Muzaffar Bhat, a social activist, noted, “construction in the Himalayas is incredibly challenging, hazardous, and complex.” For him, “building large four-lane highways and similar projects in such mountainous regions might be impractical and could have serious long-term consequences.” “The extensive tunnelling and mountain cutting required could lead to more frequent landslides and sinkholes, as well as negatively impact water systems,” Muzaffar Bhat warned. “These areas have unique geological and ecological characteristics, with intricate rock formations and small water channels that are easily disrupted.” Additionally, constructing very high pillars for bridges in earthquake-prone regions poses significant risks of natural disasters. In the last 10 years, the pace of construction of four lane highways, bridges, and tunnels has increased which has also increased landslides on the Jammu-Srinagar highway. According to the last data available, over 4,200 people lost their lives on Jammu-Srinagar national highway from 2018-2022 in the Kashmir valley. Locals are Losing Both Homes and Work Opportunities As construction continues, it is the locals living in these terrains who are paying the price for this development. Tunnelling through the mountainous areas of Pir Panjal and blasting for road expansions has led to the increase in landslides and land subsidence in these areas. The land subsidence of villages like Pernote is attributable to excavation of highways and other developmental projects. For residents of Pernote and several other adjoining villages, this development has come at a great personal cost. Families who lived in these areas for generations are now forced to abandon their homes and move to safer ground where they pay rent. “Where are we supposed to go?” asked Beer Singh, a Pernote resident. “We don't have any other lands and the government has not given us any answers.” Many families have been forced to live in nearby government buildings, rent out temporary shelters, or move in with relatives. “Our homes were everything we worked for,” Singh stated. “My whole earning was in that house.” As families grapple with the loss of their homes, the emotional toll is palpable. “I do not sleep properly at night,” Singh shared. “I keep thinking the wall will crack again and we won’t be able to escape.” Cracks visible in the house damaged after land subsidence in Pernote. Courtesy of the authors. Beer Singh is one of five brothers, whose parents are no longer alive. “We were doing well in life,” he said, recalling his land where he and his brothers cultivated pomegranates, tomatoes, and peanuts. “Farming was our livelihood throughout the year, and we sold our produce at good prices.” Living in a hilly area with a favourable climate, their crops were of high quality. "In our village, only a few people had government jobs,” he noted. “The rest relied on farming because it was profitable.” However, since the tragedy, only two or three families remain, and they live far from Singh and his family. “Now, no one comes to my shop because hardly anyone is left,” he said. “I sit here all day, unable to make sense of what happened.” The biggest issue, for Singh, is his loan repayments. He no longer receives any income and doesn’t have the money to repay his loan. After the land sinkage, many officials visited the area and promised compensation to residents of Pernote. Till date, however, these people have gotten nothing. "We were denied the initial compensation of 1,30,000 INR that others received, with the reasoning that our house had only developed cracks and hadn't collapsed entirely,” Singh shared. “However, the cracks are so severe that it's unsafe to live in, as no one can predict when it might fall.” The authorities initially issued a notice stating that the villagers would be given 10 marlas each and compensated for all damages caused by the disaster. However, the order was later changed, and they were told they’d receive only 5 lakhs INR and 1 kanal of land. As of September this year, it has been five additional months, and they still haven't received any compensation. Land sinking and landslides are not new The land sinking and landslide in these regions is not new; several incidents have been reported in the last decade. On February 1, 2023, for instance, a landslide hit Nai Basit hamlet in Doda district of Jammu and Kashmir, causing land subsidence that geologists attributed to the poor drainage system and continuous seepage from households and the movement of geological fault zones. The incident damaged 19 houses and caused a mosque with several structures to develop cracks. It forced many families to leave their homes and relocate to temporary shelters in a local government school. It also created panic in nearby villages of Ramban, where many houses had developed cracks. “It was all good until these projects started,” said Saqib, a local student. “We were living our life happily in these mountains. The government may increase the connectivity through these projects but it will make life miserable for thousands of villagers living in these mountains.” The unchecked development to increase connectivity within the Kashmir region has left residents like those in Pernote village devastated. With homes collapsing and lives uprooted, locals blame reckless infrastructure projects for these disasters. “I’m not opposed to developmental projects,” Bhat said, “but they must be carried out with proper environmental precautions and procedures.” For Muzaffar Bhat, too, it is necessary to follow sustainable development practices. “Unfortunately,” he noted, “recent political manifestos have largely ignored these environmental concerns.” Bhat suggested that if major development projects stop now, the Himalayas will likely stabilise in the next 50-60 years. “However, if these projects continue,” he warned, “the impending disaster will be unimaginable.” Specifically, the area falls in seismic zones 4 and 5, which are highly earthquake-prone. “If these projects continue and the mountains weaken further,” Bhat added, “even minor earthquakes could devastate the entire region, posing a severe threat to those living on the mountain slopes.” ∎ SUB-HEAD Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. 1 TAUSEEF AHMED is a freelance journalist from the Kashmir region of India, and he writes about South Asia. Tauseef specializes in conflict, climate change, food, and lifestyle. He holds a bachelor's degree in Mass Communication and Multimedia Production. Tauseef has three years of experience and has contributed to organizations like Women’s Media Center , FairPlanet , Two Circles , Down to Earth , Article 14 , News International , Mongabay-India , and others. MOHAMMAD AATIF AMMAD KANTH is a freelance journalist based in South Asia and covers business, economics, data, educational policies, and environmental issues. His work has been published in Down To Earth , Article 14 , India Times , Boomlive , Two Circles , Careers 360 , The Core , and others. Reportage Ramban Demolition Kashmir Urbanization Development Connectivity Pir Panjal Infrastructure National highway Pernote village Pernote tunnel waste Border Roads Organization National Highway 44 National Highway 244 Katra-Banihal railway line Srinagar lithotectonic lithotectonic sensitivity Detailed Project Report Climate Change rock fracturing land subsidence Jammu-Srinagar Highway mountain toe-cutting forced migration forced displacement ecological displacement hill farming terrace farming Nai Basit Colonialism Colonization Gentrification Urban Development environmental decay environmental hazard Seismic zone 4 Seismic zone 5 earthquake Himalayas ecological disaster Cosmopolitanism Construction Colonial Boundaries Displacement Geology Mining Chenab River Chenab Valley Ramban District Jammu 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:

Early in 2022, the signs of an unprecedented and historic movement in Sri Lanka were already visible. A dire economic crisis and a corrupt and languid government from a political dynasty that had ruled for many years in Sri Lanka bred discontent of unprecedented proportions, leading to the Aragalaya. This photo essay documents some of the earliest days of the protests. FEATURES Scenes From Gotagogama Early in 2022, the signs of an unprecedented and historic movement in Sri Lanka were already visible. A dire economic crisis and a corrupt and languid government from a political dynasty that had ruled for many years in Sri Lanka bred discontent of unprecedented proportions, leading to the Aragalaya. This photo essay documents some of the earliest days of the protests. VOL. 2 ISSUE 1 PHOTO-ESSAY AUTHOR AUTHOR AUTHOR A group of protestors wave the Sri Lankan flag on the 10th day of protests at Galle Face Green, unofficially named Gotagogama among locals. ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: AUTHOR Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 AUTHOR Heading 5 A group of protestors wave the Sri Lankan flag on the 10th day of protests at Galle Face Green, unofficially named Gotagogama among locals. SHARE Facebook ↗ Twitter ↗ LinkedIn ↗ Photo-Essay Sri Lanka 23rd Feb 2023 Photo-Essay Sri Lanka Gotagogama Aragalaya Movement Organization Capitalism Economic Crisis Energy Crisis Galle Face Green Mass Protests Mahinda Rajapaksa Gotabhaya Rajapaksa Low-Income Workers Ramadan Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. EDITOR'S NOTE: In March 2022, I was in Colombo, hosting the Fearless Ambassadors' Residency with our team. Artists had gathered from across South Asia to paint two murals in the streets of Colombo. When we arrived, little did we know that the country would break into one of the biggest protests that it has seen. There were big rallies of people burning party flags and shouting, "Gota Go Back!" A people divided had come together. Years of corruption and divisive politics led the country to one of its worst socio-political and economic crises since independence, resulting in people protesting against the incumbent President and the government. The protests, led purely by the people of Sri Lanka, especially the younger generation, supported by the workers' and students' unions, started in early March 2022 and spread islandwide. Rage in their eyes, they walked hand in hand, ready to take down the government that had left them to face acute shortages of food, fuel, and other basic supplies because of its ridiculous policies followed by the pandemic leaving the country bankrupt. It is no longer only about reform or political change but a matter of survival for the people of Sri Lanka. They were tired. Their life-long savings had been reduced to nothing. There was no petrol or cooking oil. There were long queues everywhere, anger and despair at every nook. They demanded justice for journalists and activists killed in the past and decried corruption and deception from the uppermost echelons of power. The protest in front of the Presidential Secretariat soon turned into a model village called "Gotagogama" (Go Gota Village). While the protests were peaceful, police fired tear gas at the protestors and assaulted them in an attempt to stifle the protests. There were artworks lined up, medical camps, IT support stations, and community libraries, all in one place, as if the people were reimagining every system that existed. Every morning we could see our friends and colleagues plan and participate in rallies and protests. We made posters and stood with them with affirmations such as "Take back our power" and "We are our own leaders" being passed across the streets. There was hopelessness but also a will to dismantle the system. These photographs were taken as part of the first wave of protests that broke out. Much happened after that. A few months later, in June, the people marched into the President's house and took over, watered his plants, picnic-ed in his lawns, slept in his bed, and made memes as a protest. The government changed, the village was taken down, more protestors and activists were arrested, and mysteriously disappeared. Gota Go Gama didn't exist anymore. When work took me to Colombo again later that year, I saw no big protests. Instead, I saw shoulders carrying hopelessness, eyes filled with broken dreams, and a lot of perseverance. People are struggling to get back to "normal." The new guard is no better. It has tried every tactic to crack down on anti-government movements. The real causes of the crisis are yet to be solved. Sri Lanka still awaits an IMF bailout and assurances from China and India, while the people's struggle will continue. Their struggle requires thinking about what has transpired: Harshana Rambukwella's analysis is a strong partner to the photo essay that follows. But one thing is clear: the movement of people in Sri Lanka may have subsided, but something new to Sri Lanka began in 2022. —Sabika Abbas Naqvi, Senior Editor From the earliest days, the youth were a significant driving factor in the protests against the Rajapakse government. A creative representation of the expectations of protestors using the colour red, a signifying motif of the Rajapakse regime. The Rajapaksas have been known to weaponise the colour red and inculcate hate among racial groups through their choice of clothing and colours. Protestors are using this motif against them in an ironic way. The sign translates to: "The oppressed in the queue while the oppressor is in the mansion." With such signs, protestors pointed clearly to dwindling supplies of essential resources among ordinary citizens, while those in power remain unaffected. Many children attended the protests, inciting larger conversations on politics and accountability within families—a first for many Sri Lankans. First rain at the protest site: Determined citizens continued to protest in thunderstorms and heavy rainfall. The breeding ground of Gotagogama, where the largest record of citizens gathered outside the Presidential Secretariat’s office. On March 31st 2022, a protest in Mirihana, Nugegoda (a suburb of Colombo) sparked a chain of organic and interminable protests across the country. The crowd present at this protest blocked a police bus from entering the protest site. 37 people were injured, 53 were arrested. Several journalists were brutally assaulted, with at least 6 arrested by Sri Lanka's Special Task Force. Protestors of all ages hold up signs reflecting the magnitude of the economic crisis in Sri Lanka created by the current government. Pleas to the government to right their wrongs, taken at the largest youth-led protest at Independence Square, Colombo. A figure of Mahinda Rajapakse, then-Prime Minister and Gotabhaya Rajapakse's brother, depicted holding a self-imposed request to be struck by lightning: a popular curse in Sinhalese folklore. A group of nuns join the protest to show their solidarity and dissent against the current government. People continued their fight well into the night, with many Muslims breaking their fast during the holy month of Ramadan coinciding with the beginning of summer. 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

In the immediate aftermath of the May 2025 India-Pakistan conflict, sensationalist television coverage amplified misinformation, turning a volatile border crisis into a media-fueled spectacle. As fact-checks lagged behind viral falsehoods and unverified claims of tactical victories, nationalist fervor surged on both sides of the border, eroding the credibility of journalism before the public’s eyes. THE VERTICAL Khabristan In the immediate aftermath of the May 2025 India-Pakistan conflict, sensationalist television coverage amplified misinformation, turning a volatile border crisis into a media-fueled spectacle. As fact-checks lagged behind viral falsehoods and unverified claims of tactical victories, nationalist fervor surged on both sides of the border, eroding the credibility of journalism before the public’s eyes. GENERAL REPORTAGE AUTHOR AUTHOR AUTHOR "Across Bodies and Land" (2024), graphite on handmade paper, courtesy of Rahul Tiwari. ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: AUTHOR Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 AUTHOR Heading 5 "Across Bodies and Land" (2024), graphite on handmade paper, courtesy of Rahul Tiwari. SHARE Facebook ↗ Twitter ↗ LinkedIn ↗ Reportage Delhi 16th Aug 2025 Reportage Delhi India-Pakistan Border India Pakistan Conflict Pakistan-India Conflict Armed Conflict Media wars Disinformation Misinformation Virality Viral Clips Soft War Karachi Social Media Manufacturing Consent Nationalism 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. On the night of May 9, 2025, I closely tracked the unfolding hostilities between two nuclear-armed neighbours. I was watching a debate on the ongoing border situation on the Times Now Navbhara t news channel when the TV anchor, Sushant Sinha, abruptly paused the discussion to announce with glee that “Indian forces have entered Pakistan.” A panelist in the debate, a retired Indian Army veteran, trying to whip up jingoistic fervour, urged the Indian Navy to launch an attack on Karachi, declaring, “Set fire to Karachi Port and reduce the entire city to ashes.” While India and Pakistan’s firepower echoed on the borders, another battle was taking place inside the television studios. The latest surge in violence came in the aftermath of armed militants killing 26 tourists in the meadows of Indian Kashmir in April. India labelled these as terrorist attacks and blamed Pakistan, an allegation Pakistan denies. Following the attack on Indian tourists, some in the Indian TV media adopted an aggressive nationalistic stance . They further escalated tensions by calling for retaliation against Pakistan. Some newsrooms even openly endorsed military strikes against the country, which ignited a wave of hysteria in India. In the days that followed, I spent even more time on social media monitoring India TV broadcasts, noticing frequent bursts of misinformation. A casual scroll on X (formerly Twitter) revealed a post from an obscure account alleging that India had fired towards Pakistan. Within minutes, I searched the keywords #India and #Pakistan, and my timeline was flooded with similar claims. Indian mainstream media outlets like Aaj Tak and Times Now quickly picked up these unconfirmed posts, and within an hour, they snowballed into a full-blown conflict of speculations as early as day 1. As new events unfolded on the border on successive days, the media kept broadcasting unverified content. The onslaught of misinformation that followed was staggering: images of missile strikes, anti-air defence guns firing at targets, and armed forces downing each other's fighter jets. Editors and readers alike seemed unaware that the information was from a popular tactical shooter simulation video game, Arma 3 . Archival clips also resurfaced and were presented as proof of Pakistan’s devastation of the Indian military . Many of these images and videos were not of real-time offences but came from the Russia–Ukraine war and Israeli air raids on Gaza. As the conflict escalated on day two and three, the deluge of misinformation went into full throttle. In these moments of crisis, both the Indian and Pakistani television media ditched accuracy altogether. They deceived audiences with unverified claims , manipulated visuals, and emotionally charged distortions of the ground reality. "Across Bodies and Land" (2024), graphite on handmade paper, courtesy of Rahul Tiwari. India Today reported a breaking news story that claimed that the Karachi port had been attacked by the Indian Navy; Zee News told viewers that the capital city of Islamabad had been captured. The latter even claimed that the Prime Minister of Pakistan had surrendered . ABP and NDTV news showed exclusive visuals of India’s air defence downing Pakistan drones, even though the original video was from Israel. Besides the mainstream English and Hindi media, the regional TV media joined the bandwagon as well, amplifying the misinformation. The Karachi Port Trust posted on X, denying that an attack had occurred. However, some of the newspapers had already picked up and published this news in the following day's edition.A report from the Reuters Institute said that almost half of Indian online users receive their news from television, which makes these instances of misinformation especially egregious and impactful. One of the anchors at an Indian television station did apologise for an “error,” however, the apology came nearly 12 hours after that segment had been seen by millions of viewers in India. Meanwhile, in Pakistan, the media passed off old visuals of fighter plane crashes as evidence of recent strikes on Indian fighter planes by Pakistan. Things escalated beyond newsrooms when an official X (Twitter) account of the Government of Pakistan posted footage from Arma 3 of what it claimed was real videotape of Pakistan downing India’s Rafale fighter jet. The rise of artificial intelligence played a significant role in augmenting the falsification of the conflict. AI-generated disinformation, including a deepfake video of a Pakistani military officer admitting that the country lost some of its fighter jets, was widely circulated in Indian media. Another AI-generated clip featured US President Donald Trump promising to “wipe out Pakistan,” giving fodder to Indians who believed that the United States would enter the war against Pakistan. Other AI-generated images claimed to show Pakistan’s defeat, while pictures of a Turkish pilot were falsely presented as proof that India had captured a Pakistani air force officer. A doctored version of a letter was also shared. It was falsely positioned to be from Pakistan’s government and claimed that Pakistan’s former prime minister, Imran Khan, had died in judicial custody. TV media do not operate in a vacuum, these viral clips quickly find their way to social media platforms and instant messaging mobile applications like WhatsApp. Social media users on both sides consume and share misinformation at lightning speed, especially when it aligns with nationalistic sentiment. "Across Bodies and Land" (2024), graphite on handmade paper, courtesy of Rahul Tiwari. The World Economic Forum ranked India as the country most at risk for misinformation and disinformation, which is defined as incorrect information shared to purposefully obfuscate the truth. But, false reports surged in Pakistan during the crisis as well. A Pakistani politician praised —in Parliament—about the might of his country’s air force based on an AI-generated image of a British newspaper. Of course, most military crises lead to a surge in falsehoods and unverified claims. While the media is supposed to inform the public, during these delicate moments, much of the television coverage descends into a spectacle of exaggeration, rumor, and nationalistic war mongering . From fabricated airstrikes to altered footage , the focus shifts away from facts toward constructing a narrative of preemptive victory and toward manufacturing consent for potential war crimes. In today’s digital world, this misinformation is not limited to local viewers. It moves quickly, heightening tensions and fueling broader cycles of global propaganda. The long-term consequences of such wartime fallacies are deeply damaging. By amplifying rumors and unverified stories, both Indian and Pakistani television media deepened public divisions, pushing citizens into isolated, conflicting realities. A similar situation occurred in 2019, after the killing of Indian paramilitary soldiers in Kashmir. False and misleading images and videos circulating on social media were republished by mainstream media, fuelling the calls for military retaliation against rival Pakistan. This conduct erodes the ethos of journalism. Audiences start to see all media as biased or deceptive. For fact-checkers in the field, debunking these falsehoods is an enormous challenge, and by the time fact-checked content reaches the general public, truth has already become the ultimate casualty. ∎ 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

Acclaimed musician and composer Vijay Iyer on how the constraints of musical genre emerged from racial capitalism: the history of "jazz" itself narrated by delinking music from its Black radical and avant-garde traditions. COMMUNITY Musical Genre as a Creation of Racial Capitalism Acclaimed musician and composer Vijay Iyer on how the constraints of musical genre emerged from racial capitalism: the history of "jazz" itself narrated by delinking music from its Black radical and avant-garde traditions. VOL. 1 INTERVIEW AUTHOR AUTHOR AUTHOR Watch the interview on YouTube or IGTV. ALSO IN THIS ISSUE: AUTHOR Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 Heading 5 AUTHOR Heading 5 Watch the interview on YouTube or IGTV. SHARE Facebook ↗ Twitter ↗ LinkedIn ↗ Interview Jazz 8th Nov 2020 Interview Jazz Criticism Music Music Criticism Race & Genre Black Radical Traditions Amiri Baraka Roscoe Mitchell Racial Capitalism Avant-Garde Origins Village Vanguard Post-George Floyd Moment Historicity Black Speculative Musicalities Insurgence in Jazz Genre Fluidity Critical Improvisation Studies The Aesthetics of the Black Radical Tradition Fred Moten Charles Mingus Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. Add paragraph text. Click “Edit Text” to customize this theme across your site. You can update and reuse text themes. We go through these cycles of the mainstream press declaring jazz dead, then rediscovering it. There's a savior! That narrative's really problematic. It excludes and erases countless Black musicians who have been at the vanguard for decades. RECOMMENDED: Uneasy (ECM, 2021): Vijay Iyer with Tyshawn Sorey and Linda May Han Oh. 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