Iran #StandWithKashmir rally.

Kashmiri children being arrested: brutalizing children is another malignant human rights crime shared by India & Israel.

Hamburg, Germany #StandWithKashmir rally.

This poem by Otto Rene Castillo expresses so beautifully & so much less stridently than my castigations of socialists who eulogize Immanuel Wallerstein, debate Kautsky vs Lenin, & parse differences between Sanders & Warren but have never uttered a peep about (or much worse, support) slaughter in Idlib, the genocide in Palestine, the Rohingya & Uyghur struggles against genocide, or the siege & blockade of Kashmir. If you do not stand with the oppressed but consider thinking deep irrelevant thoughts is sufficient to call yourself a socialist, you are pissing on the wrong leg & calling it rain.

One day
the apolitical
intellectuals
of my country
will be interrogated
by the simplest
of our people.

They will be asked
what they did
when their nation died out
slowly,
like a sweet fire
small and alone.

No one will ask them
about their dress,
their long siestas
after lunch,
no one will want to know
about their sterile combats
with “the idea
of the nothing”
no one will care about
their higher financial learning.

They won’t be questioned
on Greek mythology,
or regarding their self-disgust
when someone within them
begins to die
the coward’s death.

They’ll be asked nothing
about their absurd
justifications,
born in the shadow
of the total lie.

On that day
the simple men will come.

Those who had no place
in the books and poems
of the apolitical intellectuals,
but daily delivered
their bread and milk,
their tortillas and eggs,
those who drove their cars,
who cared for their dogs and gardens
and worked for them,
and they’ll ask:

“What did you do when the poor
suffered, when tenderness
and life
burned out of them?”

Apolitical intellectuals
of my sweet country,
you will not be able to answer.

A vulture of silence
will eat your gut.

Your own misery
will pick at your soul.

And you will be mute in your shame.

— Otto Rene Castillo

I would be the last to hold much stock in what US politicians say, but Congresswomen Rashida Tlaib & Ilhan Omar are playing a singular role in their outspoken defiance & refusal to conform to Zionism & Islamophobia in the US Congress. I must say that Ilhan Omar’s statement on Kashmir was not particularly informed or impressive, especially her call for “deescalation” rather than the immediate withdrawal of all Indian troops. This statement by Rashida Tlaib is much more informed & powerful, with the exclusion of “While I have deep respect for India…” But it also has the weakness of calling for the US to “support a UN-backed peaceful resolution” instead of the immediate withdrawal of Indian troops. It’s not nitpicking to make that objection. There can be no possible peaceful resolution, whether UN-backed or not, without the immediate, unconditional withdrawal of all Indian troops from Kashmir. Tlaib also calls for due process for Kashmiri political prisoners detained without charge when she should have called for the immediate release of all political prisoners.

https://tlaib.house.gov/media/press-releases/rep-tlaib-statement-situation-jammu-and-kashmir?

This post from September 14, 2019 by Shaykh Shakeel Bin Abdullah elaborates the economic reasons why India wants complete control of Kashmir. It’s about hydroelectricity produced in Kashmir which is vital to India but a drain on Kashmir’s economy & ecology. This is part of what Indian scholar Jairus Banaji referred to when he discussed India’s goal of “unfettered exploitation” of Kashmiri resources as a primary cause of the siege & blockade.

1) 30% of the present Indian hydroelectricity is produced in Kashmir.

2) 7 out of the 11 hydroelectric projects announced by the National Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC) are located in Kashmir, accounting to 60% of the total electricity production.

3) NHPC, in rest of the Indian states, works on a 50:50 sharing basis, i.e. 50% of the electricity goes to the state and 50% is given to NHPC for their investment. But in Kashmir the equation changes. Only 12% is given to Kashmir as royalty and 88% is taken away by NHPC & supplied to the northern grid of India via Punjab to Delhi, Haryana etc.

4) Incidentally, peak hour requirement of electricity in Kashmir is 2000 Megawatts. Not able to fulfill it, the government of J&K has to buy electricity worth 3600 crores annually from the same northern grid to which it supplies its produced electricity.

5) NHPC succeeds in producing electricity at the cheapest possible rate in Kashmir i.e 25 paise per unit. But to fulfill its peak hour requirement, Kashmir has to buy the same electricity at Rs. 10 a unit from the northern grid, generating humongous profits for the sellers!

6) The Indus Water Treaty which was signed between India & Pakistan lays down the sharing pattern of the water bodies originating in Kashmir. As per that treaty, India has the exclusive right to use the water of the three eastern rivers viz a viz Sutlej, Beas and Ravi before they enter pakistan. And Pakitan has the right to use the water of other three western rivers, namely, Jhelum, Indus and Chenab. What Kashmir gets in return is 12% royalty from India. Isn’t it ironical? We can easily bargain, Pakistan has more riparian rights than India. I think this scares Indian state.

7) Punjab owes 2,200 crores on account of compensation to Kashmir.

As per the figures given by Chief minister Omar Abdullah in may 2010, Kashmir suffers an annual loss of 50000 crores when its water is used by India and Pakistan. Keeping the share 50%, Kashmir is suffering a loss of whooping 25000 crores annually because of India. Incidentally, in the year 2009-10, Kashmir received an annual central assistance of 13952 crores from India.

9) Out of these 13952 crores, 3600 crores was spent on buying its own electricity from the northern grid which was stolen by India. 5500 crores was used for the defense purpose just because 670000 troops are present to guard Kashmir from 300 militants (Government figures) present over here. Rest of the money is being used for ‘development’ purpose.

From September 14, 2018: now, not just Aasif Sultan is imprisoned, but several other journalists & at least 4,000 Kashmiri activists since August 5th, 2019.

The siege & blockade of Kashmir began shortly after I announced my candidacy as an independent socialist for 2020 US presidency. My intention remains to use my campaign for the same political purposes as I do my FB wall: to advance the struggles of the oppressed & include their voices in the US electoral campaign. But I’m kind of a single-minded girl, what some choose to diagnose as cognitive disfunction, & have been unable to maintain that wall. Would anyone think it inappropriate if I just post there what I post on my own wall, since that was close to my intention in the first place?

Nearly one-million Indian soldiers equipped to fight counterinsurgency have been unable to stop Kashmiris from protesting the occupation & demanding #azaadi. This protest yesterday is in the Soura neighborhood of Srinagar. Our deepest respect & fullest solidarity with the protesters.

#StandWithKashmir

As Shabir Wani has pointed out, there are a lot of things we miss about Kashmiris on Facebook: their humor, in-depth knowledge, acumen, expertise, sharpening skills; also their sharp polemics, insights, indignation. But the thing we miss most of all is their political leadership.

Kashmiri human rights investigators & activists play an international role in campaigning against the use of forcible disappearance used by up to 50 countries & they are recognized for that role by families of the disappeared around the world. Kashmiri feminists, along with Mayan women, play a leading role in exposing & campaigning against the use of mass rape, sexual torture & humiliation used by armies as a weapon of war & genocide. Kashmiri human rights organizations investigate human rights crimes by the Indian Army & rigorously document them. Despite being under a brutal occupation, they always protested in solidarity with others, including Palestinians, Rohingya, Syrians, Central African Republic, & others on the front lines of oppression as well as protested against pellet guns, the suppression of a free press, & other human rights crimes by the Indian Army.

From the courage of their working class stone pelters & protesters to the undaunted commitment of senior leaders like 90-year-old Syed Ali Geelani, they educated human rights fighters around the world. They took advantage of social media to educate about their struggle & build international support. That’s the reason India repeatedly snapped the internet & now has completely shut down all telecommunications in Kashmir. The intention is to humiliate Kashmiris & bring them to their knees but mostly to prevent them from inspiring, educating, leading the oppressed around the world. The political leadership shown & groundwork laid by Kashmiri activists has made India’s genocidal move a massive political blunder because all of Kashmiri’s painstaking work has led to the internationalization of their struggle with thousands marching around the world in solidarity & #BoycottIndia in formation.