COMMENTS POSTED ON THE TIMES OF INDIA Q&A INTERVIEW OF MS. FLAVIA AGNES BY JYOTI PUNWANI: Women's rights would fall into place with secure economic rights:

COMMENTS POSTED ON THE TIMES OF INDIA Q&A INTERVIEW OF MS. FLAVIA AGNES BY JYOTI PUNWANI: Women's rights would fall into place with secure economic rights:

Though the very seasoned women's right activist Ms. Flavia Agnes's words in this interview may be welcome when she candidly admits that "Every modern concept of marriage already exists in Islamic law - be it viewing marriage as a contract between equals with prenuptial agreements, giving the wife a share in property and economic security, acknowledging that marriage may not be lifelong, providing for arbitration and if that fails, for a quick and easy dissolution through divorce by consent, with a fair and reasonable settlement. All this evolved at a time when other religions were very oppressive towards women. In the 7th century, the Prophet Muhammad held the view that wives aren't slaves - they have an independent identity and need economic security. How can it ever be construed that a Prophet so compassionate towards women would deny their rights to matrimonial property? In fact, the Muslim Women's Act (MWA) of 1986 has already incorporated this principle."

However, she ignores TWO main factors that should be considered before reformists try to improve on Sharia. In India, the enactment of Muslim Personal Law, back in British rule in 1937, was meant to keep sharia intact against the incursions by governments through arbitrary fiats. That main objective of Muslim Personal Law should not only be kept in mind when Muslim affairs are in question; but the caution should be extended as to why a secular state and government should be interfering in the personal laws of different religion, be that Brahmin, Sikh, Jain, Parsi etc. British justice was colonial justice. India's secular constitution should stick more strictly to its secularism and leave the religious matters best to be sorted out by various religious communities. Why should Nehru have meddled in Hindu personal laws when he was publicly declaring that India is not a Hindu nation, but a secular republic.

India's women's rights movement is heavily influenced by Western ideas that need not always be relevant in Secular India with very high public commitment to religious tradition.

The second point that Ms. Agnes should have taken into consideration when it comes to Muslims and Islam, that Sharia has a holistic view of the family as a basic unit. We cannot think of apportioning properties among Muslim members of families without taking into consideration the very strict inheritance laws. Any effort to preempt those ratios will be null and void. It would have been better if Ms. Flavia should have first cleared her legislative initiative with Muslim Personal Law Board, who effectively represents the 180 million Muslims of India, at least intellectually. She is as guilty of ignoring Muslim Personal Law Board, as the English media, among others, in Mumbai that did not care to cover the huge gathering of about 200,000 Muslim protestors at Azad maidan, possibly at the behest of the ruling Congress party.

Ghulam Muhammed, Mumbai

<ghulammuhammed3@gmail.com>

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http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/opinion/edit-page/Womens-rights-would-fall-into-place-with-secure-economic-rights/articleshow/12924354.cms

'Women's rights would fall into place with secure economic rights'

Apr 30, 2012, 12.00AM IST

Feminist lawyer Flavia Agnes 's organisation Majlis has helped draft Maharashtra's new matrimonial property Bill, giving women an equal share in matrimonial property. However, some traditional community leaders want Muslim women kept out of the purview of this Bill. Speaking with Jyoti Punwani , Agnes explains why a law like this would not override existing Muslim personal law provisions safeguarding women in marital distress - and how crucial economic security is to the well-being of all women:

How did you get involved with drafting this law?

When reports about the Maharashtra government proposing a matrimonial property Bill first appeared, Majlis met the concerned minister who invited us to draft a Billa¦it's my firm belief that all women's rights would fall into place if we're able to secure their economic rights. This is crucial to protect women from destitution - what can maintenance of Rs 500 do for you and your children? Therefore, after consultations with bureaucrats, lawyers, judges and activists, we came up with this draft.

Did you anticipate a negative reaction?

I anticipated a backlash from men's rights groups but not from Muslim leaders - this is because whatever progress matrimonial law has made in India has brought it closer to Islamic law. Every modern concept of marriage already exists in Islamic law - be it viewing marriage as a contract between equals with prenuptial agreements, giving the wife a share in property and economic security, acknowledging that marriage may not be lifelong, providing for arbitration and if that fails, for a quick and easy dissolution through divorce by consent, with a fair and reasonable settlement.

All this evolved at a time when other religions were very oppressive towards women. In the 7th century, the Prophet Muhammad held the view that wives aren't slaves - they have an independent identity and need economic security. How can it ever be construed that a Prophet so compassionate towards women would deny their rights to matrimonial property? In fact, the Muslim Women's Act (MWA) of 1986 has already incorporated this principle.

But will you be able to convince traditional community leaders of this today?

Muslim leaders do know about our earlier work with the communitya¦and today, the ulema or clergy are not saying that Muslim women have no rights - their claim is that Muslim women already have a right in sharia. This can be acknowledged and provided for in the new law where a section states that if a woman has a similar right under her personal law, she can avail of it. Muslim women must persuade the Personal Law Board to set up the machinery that will give women this Islamic right.

Is there a possibility of history being repeated - with echoes of the Shah Bano case - if leaders can ultimately prevail on the government to exclude Muslim women from this law?

Shah Bano's case resulted in the MWA. The Supreme Court upheld its validity in 2002. The MWA has actually given far more in lump sum settlements to divorced Muslim women than any secular law. The media highlights only negative instances, such as Imrana and Gudiya, but not the victories of Muslim women under their personal law. If Muslim women are excluded from this new law, they'd still have the right to ask for a settlement under MWA - and the exclusion could also be challenged

Indian Muslims Still Paying the Price of Partition - By Karamatullah K. Ghori, The Milli Gazette

http://www.milligazette.com/news/3501-indian-muslims-still-paying-the-price-of-partition

Indian Muslims Still Paying the Price of Partition

By Karamatullah K. Ghori, The Milli Gazette

Published Online: Apr 12, 2012 - Print Issue: 16-30 April 2012

What’s is it like being a Muslim in India 65 years after the cataclysm of August 1947 that unleashed the ‘Great Divide’ in the South Asian subcontinent and spawned India and Pakistan?

The question comes naturally to every curious mind keen to know how the largest minority, i.e., its Muslims numbering around 180 million is doing in what the western world is so prone to referring as ‘Shining India.’

But for a Muslim who may have spent the better part of his life living in, or working for, Pakistan-and now living in the west-the question assumes both a greater curiosity than normal and an added intensity of passion, for the simple reason that he was born an Indian Muslim himself. In plain language, this scribe: born in Delhi, migrated to Pakistan as a child with little inkling as to why he was leaving his ancestral abode, but in all of his adult years remaining sentimentally tethered to the place of his birth; the place where his ancestors are buried.

They say-a saying attributed more to the Muslims of India-that Pakistanis, especially those who came over from those parts of the Subcontinent that fell to India, can’t help carrying a guilt syndrome in regard to their fellow Muslims in India. That may be true but of that generation of Pakistanis which has long since gone to its graves. They-my elders-were old enough at the time of the Partition to know what they were doing. Or were they really conscious of what they were doing? Did they suffer from any guilt syndrome?

I never got to ask this question of my father. He wouldn’t allow me even if I’d the gumption to put him this question. He was astute and straight as an arrow. No looking back, in his case. And he was quite forthright about it; he didn’t want to look back.

So the guilt syndrome may not have been passed on to me as a legacy of my elders. But as a student of history I’ve never been too distant from academic curiosity to entertain the idea-and nurture it consciously-to visit India as often as possible to keep tabs on fellow Muslims and their lot in that place where they had been rulers for centuries but have now been reduced to minority status in a huge country, with a bulging population second only to China.

As a career diplomat in the service of Pakistan visiting India wasn’t a very popular idea, though nobody ever posed me any hurdles when I asked for permission to visit my ancestral abode. But exigencies and demands of an overtly engrossing career wouldn’t give me more than two opportunities-the first in 1980 and the next in 1988-to set foot on the land of my progenitors.

However, long before any Indian Muslim would hazard to pose the question of guilt or not on my part, it’s the Indian Consul in Toronto who reminds me that my parents-God bless their departed souls-had made a horrible mistake when they scooped me up in Delhi and took me across the border to Pakistan.

‘I’ sorry, Sir,’ he tells me with a poker face, ‘but I’m afraid I can’t give you a visa to India on your Canadian passport.’

‘But why on earth would you do that? I ask, totally flabbergasted and miffed, ‘this Canadian passport is the most sought-after in the world and people would give their left-hand to get one.’

‘True, Sir,’ he remains unfazed, ‘but in the hands of a former Pakistani it doesn’t get an Indian visa,’ he’s quite matter-of-factly.

‘But my dear man, ‘I protest, ‘I was an Indian before I became a Pakistani. I was born in Delhi, what about that?’

‘Quite right, Sir,’ he intones, ‘but you migrated to Pakistan.’

And then he adds, ‘We’ll give you visa on your Canadian passport if only you’d give us an affidavit, in writing, that you’ve renounced your Pakistani nationality.’

‘You can’t be serious,’ I’m close to exasperation if not quite ready to explode, ‘you think I’ll ever ‘renounce’ my Pakistani nationality for the sake of a visa to India? Forget about it. You’re being naïve.’

In the end, it was my ‘official’ Pakistani passport that saved the day for me. I couldn’t be refused a visa on an official passport; and for an added courtesy, or a sweetener to take care of the egregious hurt caused to me, I was to be exempted from reporting to police and register with them upon arrival in India-a must for ordinary Pakistanis venturing into India. Police reporting marks them, instantly, as suspects that must be kept under surveillance.

So that’s it: the Indians associate nationality to land, whereas in Pakistan it’s to the idea of Pakistan; a commitment to a notion and not so much to a patch of earth.

The Pakistani perception of nationality-thankfully, to people like me-is not land-bound, which it’s in India. That’s why Pakistan allows its nationals to take other nationalities without surrendering their Pakistani nationality. No wonder that some, like this scribe, have moved on to other lands, far distant from Pakistan, and settled down there. But their second migration hasn’t, in any way, overshadowed their commitment or adherence to Pakistan or diluted their moorings in the idea of Pakistan.

But how do our Muslim brothers-proverbially left behind in India and deserted by us-feel about the idea of Pakistan? Do they approve of our unflinching commitment to it? Or do they rather think it was naïve and quite tentative of us to imagine that adherence to a common religion would override and circumvent all the fault-lines that divided, or still divide, the Subcontinent on ethnic, linguistic or sectarian bases?

These were some of the questions I routinely posed to my Muslim interlocutors, of all ages and persuasions, in the course of my month-long sojourn in India-my first in 24 years.

I distinctly recall that in my previous visit to India-24 years ago, in 1988-I was often cut short, brusquely, when I posed the same question. They-and some of them were men of great insight and clarity of thought-would instantly blurt out that it was a preposterous idea for Mr. Jinnah (Quaid-e-Azam, or great leader, to us, Pakistanis) and all of his cohorts and flunkies to think that bonds of a common religion, alone, could keep a disparate people together.

‘Look,’ they would say with ill-disguised ire (some even with banter and a chuckle) ‘you couldn’t keep East Pakistan with you for even a quarter century; the Bengalis had had enough of your flirtation with romance, if not your outright cruelty to them. So they decided to go their separate way.’

They were right. East Pakistan became Bangladesh and put paid to the idea of Pakistan, as far as they were concerned. Or, as the then Indian PM, Indira Gandhi, had boasted with venom, the ideology of Pakistan was cremated in the Paltan Maidan of Dhaka, that black December day, of 1971, when Pakistan’s General ‘Tiger’ Niazi, had meekly surrendered to his victorious Indian counter-part, General Aurora.

Maulana Abul Kalam Azad-the sage, the clairvoyant, perhaps the only one in the galaxy of leaders that adorned the then firmament of India possessing a prophetic vision-was then routinely cited to buttress the argument against the idea of Pakistan. Not so much now.

It was, in fact, heart-rending to me to see the Maulana’s tomb, under the feet of Delhi’s still majestic Jama Masjid, bearing tell-tale signs of neglect. I felt sad, very sad, at the apathy of our Muslim brothers for not according to the sage’s tomb the decorum and dignity it so rightly and richly deserves. I rushed to see it as soon as I was done with the Friday prayers on my first Friday in Delhi.

I wanted to pay my respects to the sage all the more-felt an incontinent urge for it-after listening to the sermon of the Masjid’s custodian and Imam, Maulana Bukhari. It wasn’t a typical Friday sermon but more in the format of a political address. The U.P. elections were in the air and the Shahi Imam, Maulana Bukhari’s popular title, was blowing hot-and cold (more hot than cold, in fact scalding hot) with the rhetoric and eloquence of a seasoned political campaigner on-the- stump.

Maulana Azad’s tomb, in palpable neglect and decay, seems to have become a favourite hang-out for junkies. I could tell from the hazy and clouded faces of a dozen or so of them languishing in the shade of the tomb that they were there because the authorities wouldn’t bother them in its sanctuary.

Ironically, the Maulana is now the most-quoted political thinker and sage in Pakistan. The rising graph of his popularity and acceptability in Pakistan is in inverse proportion to his fading profile in ‘Shining India.’ I didn’t hear him quoted half as much in India as I would in contemporary Pakistan.

There was a time, in the early days of Pakistan, when Maulana Azad, was more reviled than Gandhi or Nehru. They’d refer to him as the Congress’ Trojan horse. The two-bit maulvis of Pakistan despised him and would mention him with rancour.

No more of that nonsense. The Maulana is the star attraction and piece de resistance in the increasingly popular and ongoing dialogue that questions the logic of Pakistan. They quote him with admiration and awe as the man who could see the future of Pakistan even before its birth.

Maulana Azad’s welcome intrusion into the critique of Pakistan is, no doubt, as much a belated recognition of his intellectual stature as a product of the Pakistani intelligentsia’s bitter frustration with the dismal performance of Pakistan as a state.

Frustration is also writ large on the Muslims of India. But the critique of Pakistan among the Indian Muslims is a product of Pakistan’s holistic failure; it blends dismay at the idea of Pakistan with its dismal failure as a state.

What impressed me, outstandingly, was the absence of rancour against the idea of Pakistan, which was so much evident in the two earlier visits, 1980 and 1988. By the same token, scorn at the founder of Pakistan, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, has come down markedly, if not exponentially.

There’s more pathos than passion in the Indian Muslim discourse of the day on Pakistan. The typical argument I heard in my visit went something like this: ‘Look,’ they’d say with no visible shade of hurt, ‘Pakistan may have been a bad idea. But it’s a reality, now, and we can’t wish it away. On the contrary, we wish it all success and pray for it. We’ve, after all, our kith and kin there whose life and future is dear to us. We don’t want any harm to come to them, or to the country they call home.’

‘That’s mature and healthy,’ I’d quip. But would then quickly turn to my favourite theme in the discourse: ‘Do you still think Pakistan is responsible for the plethora of your problems in India? Do you feel we, the Mohajirs of Pakistan, turned our backs on you and left you to the mercy of India’s majority population? Have you been treated unfairly, to say the least, because we deserted you?’

Some of my interlocutors were more charitable than others. ‘We’ve overcome the trauma of desertion that rankled us so much in the early decades after Partition,’ they’d console me, ‘but the sense of hurt revisits us every time there is a Babri Masjid tragedy, of 1992, or the mayhem of Gujarat, 2002. The revanchist Hindus wouldn’t have dared to pounce on us, as they did on those two occasions and many others before them, had there been no Pakistan. Just imagine what formidable strength we’d be as one Muslim people of India. Add the numbers to get the sense of what we’re saying: 180 million Pakistanis, 160 million Bangladeshis and 180 million Indian Muslims. That makes it a staggering number of half a billion-plus Muslims. Would anyone, in their right mind, have dared to take us on collectively?’

‘Your argument has merit and obvious thrust,’ I’d concede. But before I could continue there’d be quick intervention: ‘Look, forget about any other argument and just read the eye-opening report of the Sachar Committee. It tells you, more graphically than any Muslim could argue, of what horrendous price the Muslims of India are still paying for the creation of Pakistan.’

This debate is to be continued. (MG)

 
This article appeared in The Milli Gazette print issue of 16-30 April 2012

http://twocircles.net/2012apr26/thousands_march_delhi_against_israeli_influence_india.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Twocirclesnet-IndianMuslim+%28TwoCircles.net+-+Indian+Muslim+News%29

Thousands march in Delhi against Israeli influence in India

Submitted by admin4 on 26 April 2012 - 9:41pm

• Indian Muslim

By TCN News,

New Delhi: Thousands marched today to express their concern on the growing influence of Israel in India. The march was convened by Movement for Civil Rights, an alliance of many civil-society and religious organization under the leadership of Dr. Maulana Mufti Mukaram, Imam of Delhi’s Fatehpuri Masjid. The organizers asked the Indian government to snap all ties with Israel.
The marched started today from Ram Leela Maidan around 10 am and reached Jantar Mantar. Later a public meeting was held at Jantar mantar.



Mufti Mukarram addressing the gathering.

Mufti Mukaram while addressing the gathering said “Gandhiji was against Zionism and our first PM Nehru made India part of the Non-Aligned Movement but unfortunately, in early nineties this policy was changed drastically by the government led by P. V. Narasimha Rao who established formal diplomatic relations with Israel in 1991. Since then the country has become the largest customer of Israeli military equipments that are nothing but modified versions of US products. India is Israel's largest defence market, accounting for almost 50 percent of Israeli arms sales.”

Later on the Programme Convener and SDPI National Gen Secretary Hafiz Manzoor Ali Khan said that “That Israeli diplomats have established relations with various State Governments and this kind of relations are void and against the norms of our country. 

Mossad have regularly intervened in investigations in various cases which indicate that Israel does not have trust in the capacity of Indian investigation agencies”.



EM Abdul Rahiman Chairman Popular Front of India said that “our growing civil and military ties with the illegitimate government of Israel are in gross violation of our great traditions and secular, democratic ethos.” He cautioned that engaging Israel agencies like Mossad in tackling our domestic law and order problems will ultimately endanger the very autonomy and dignity of our police, military and intelligence agencies. The recent incidents like the arrest of a senior journalist in the Israel embassy car blast are intended to suppress the voices against the Zionist atrocities. He stated that the terror agenda of Israel will get defeated in the Indian soil as a result of the united democratic resistance that is gaining strength in our country”.

Abdul Wahab Khilji President – All India Islahi movement said “ Israel has been always an entertainer of terrorism and was created by violence, And Israel relation with India with create tension in the nation as well it will a endorsement of the Israel’s oppression on Palestinian”.



Later in his speech Dalit leader Udit Raj of Confederation of SC ST Organisation said “it’s high time that an alliance should be formed between Dalit and Muslims and they should vote for themselves.”
Moulana Usman Baig president of All India Imams Council in his speech said that “the audio tapes seized from the laptop of Dayanand Pandey, an accused in various bomb blast cases carried out by Hindutva groups reveal that Col. Srikant Purohit, the king-pin of the terror group had sought the support of Israel. There are two reasons behind terrorism in India one is the Israel and the other is the fascist forces. It is also worth notice that the increasing ties with Israel had very grave impact on the country’s security”.



While addressing the public Turab Ali Kazmi son of arrested journalist Ahmed Kazmi said “that the only reason for arrest of his father is that he wrote the truth about America and Israel”. 

National Secretary of National Confederation of Human Rights Organization Advocate A Mohamed Yusuf told “Israel is a cancer which is killing thousands of people, if we allow this cancer in our country it may lead to unhealthy situation.” Ahmed Kazmi was arrested on suspicion of supporting people who planted bomb in an Israeli diplomat car in New Delhi. He has been in detention since February.

Other people who addressed the public are:

Dr Baseer Ahmed Khan, President, Indian Union Muslim League
Maulana Amir Rashadi, President, Rastriya Ulama Council
Adv Bahar U Barqui, Advocate, Supreme Court
Zaheer Zaidi, President, Shia Point
Yasin Patel, Co-ordinator, Wahdet-e-Islami
Dr Anwar ul Islam, Secretary, AIMMM
Irfanullah Khan, Convener, Jamia Nagar Coordinator Committee
Dr Taslim Rahmani, President, NPCI
Faisal Khan, President, Khudai Khidmatgar
Adv A Mohamed Yusuf, Sec. NCHRO
Anisu Zaman, National President, Campus Front

A memorandum demanding severance of all ties with Israel was submitted to the Prime Minister of India by a team led by Hafiz Manzoor Ali Khan.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/26/world/asia/26iht-letter26.html?_r=1&emc=tnt&tntemail1=y

Letter from India

'National' Loses Power as an Idea in India

By MANU JOSEPH

Published: April 25, 2012

¶ NEW DELHI — This sentence has no meaning: “Tea to be declared Indian national drink.”

But that was the headline this week in several newspapers that reported on a proposal of the deputy chairman of the Planning Commission of India, a government body that plans things. What will happen after tea is declared the national drink? Nothing much, of course. But once word got out, an influential cooperative society of milk producers said that milk, and not tea, should be declared the Indian national drink.

¶ It is odd that this fuss has arrived at a time when the very idea of “national” is becoming irrelevant in India, especially in matters far more serious than tribute to tea. The political supremacy of New Delhi and the central government is being challenged by state governments and other regional forces.

¶ About three months ago, when the Indian government decided to allow 100 percent foreign investment in single-brand retail stores, several regional governments refused to implement the policy because they wanted to protect small businesses in their states. 

Also, the central government has been unable to push through its plan for a national anti-terrorism agency because some states are unwilling to make their own law enforcement agencies subordinate to such a central authority.

¶ There was a time when the chief ministers of the states would arrive in the capital like indebted peasants to plead for funds from the masters of Delhi, but now they simply raise a stink when they don’t get enough. It appears that every fortnight or so the authority of the center, even its common sense and credibility, are publicly challenged by the states.

¶ A major reason for this is that the Indian National Congress, which heads the alliance that forms the Indian government, has been diminished. The supremacy of the center made sense when the Congress party was at the height of its powers both in Delhi and in several states. But the party has lost power in many of its traditional strongholds, and with the spectacular rise of regional parties, national is not what it used to be.

¶ For most of modern India’s history, everything national was superior to what was near and familiar. After all, wasn’t it true that national highways were broader than state highways, central government jobs better paying than state government jobs and the prime minister more powerful than a state chief minister?

¶ In the early 1980s, even in the states where the Congress party had only a modest hold, like in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was unfailingly granted the honor of a great spectacle. Huge crowds went to see her. She never spoke in Hindi because there was a powerful sentiment against the perceived imperialism of Hindi. She would speak in English, and P. Chidambaram, who was then an emerging star of the Congress party and is now minister of home affairs, would stand beside her and translate into Tamil. But her opening words would usually be in Tamil, a tortured, practiced Tamil, as a grand condescension of a national figure from Delhi to the peripheral people of Tamil Nadu. And the crowds would erupt in honest joy. Later, when her son Rajiv first visited Madras, schools were closed so that children could go and gawk at him.

¶ India does not have a national politician anymore, who is national in the true sense of the word.

¶ The power of the center was in no small part derived from the idea of central planning. The Planning Commission, the same agency whose deputy chairman was behind tea as the national drink, decided from Delhi what all industries would produce, how much and for what purpose. Central planning damaged the Indian economy for years and survives today in a much less deadly form.

¶ In the past two decades, with economic liberalization, the political sphere of the Indian has become much smaller. Even in the national elections, he votes on local issues, for local politicians. Delhi still does attract politicians, but its glow is dimming. Four years ago, when Raj Thackeray, a rising politician in Mumbai, instigated violence against migrants from North India, I asked him if he was worried that he would never be accepted outside the western state of Maharashtra, that he would never become “national.” He told me that he didn’t see the point of being a national leader.

¶ It is not just in politics that the power of the national has diminished. The news media are increasingly forced to become regional. Most of India’s English-language newspapers consider themselves national publications. But they are not so in spirit. They have multiple editions, and on most days local reports overshadow national news.

¶ Scores of regional news channels in Indian languages have sprouted, many of them financed by political parties. English-language television news channels believe that they are national, and as a consequence are confused about what their viewers want to watch. They have seen their political clout shrink and are saved largely by the belief of advertisers that the elite consumers of the English news channels have considerable purchasing power.

¶ Accustomed to decades of concentration of power, Delhi’s elite is a well-run confederation of cozy cartels containing politicians, bureaucrats, merchants, middlemen, journalists, novelists and people whose day jobs cannot be easily described. They take care of their own. That is how they guard their mediocrity.

¶ As the idea of “national” sinks into obsolescence, it will one day liberate the rest of India from the hold of Delhi. In a way, that has already begun to happen.

¶ Manu Joseph is editor of the Indian newsweekly Open and author of the novel “Serious Men.”

Sunday, April 22, 2012

MUSLIM PERSONAL LAW BOARD PUBLIC MEETING AT MUMBAI'S AZAD MAIDAN RATTLES UPA GOVERNMENT

It is surprising that DNA & TwoCircle.Net should be a willing conduit to release this piece of mischief-mongering news, at the exact timing, when All India Muslim Personal Law Board is holding its public session at Mumbai's Azad Maidan and where thousands of Muslims are congregating to hear from their elders, about the evil designs of some communal elements in either Congress or the government bureaucracy. All issues that AIMPLB is  raising are the most disturbing to Muslim minority and instead of a democratic secular government, addressing them in true democratic fashion, is poised to take revenge on Muslims for not voting for them in Uttar Pradesh elections. This is an open challenge to India's democratic values. Government must accept the verdict of the people and should not allow fascist elements to take over its governance. It is common knowledge that government agencies have deliberately projected SIMI as a violent organisation, though court cases against arrested SIMI members have been overwhelmingly thrown out without conviction. Government is abusing its powers to demoralize Muslim agitators, who are merely agitating for their constitutional rights. It exposes the cowardice of the agencies that now they have resorted to planting media stories without having to face accountability. But justice is not dead in India, yet.

GHULAM MUHAMMED, Mumbai
<ghulammuhammed3@gmail.com>

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http://www.dnaindia.com/mumbai/report_simi-front-hosts-muslim-scholars-meet-in-mumbai_1679030

‘Simi front’ hosts Muslim scholars’ meet in Mumbai

Published: Sunday, Apr 22, 2012, 8:24 IST
 

By Iftikhar Gilani | Place: Mumbai | Agency: DNA

The Khair-e-Ummat Trust, which is organising the three-day convention of the All-India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) in Mumbai, has been declared as one of the frontal organisations of the banned Students Islamic Movement of India (Simi) by the government in an affidavit filed before a judicial tribunal here earlier on Thursday. The trust is among the 51 organisations the government believes are Simi fronts that aid the regrouping of its cadres to revive the banned outfit. The one-man justice VK Shali judicial tribunal began the hearing on the continuation of Simi ban last Wednesday. A background note filed by the home ministry, the copy of which is with DNA, states that Simi has managed to keep its network alive through clandestine activities and frontal organisations. In Maharashtra, the documents listseight such organisations, with the Khair-e-Umaat Trust topping the order. Others from the state included Adara Khair-e-Ummat, Tehreek-e-Hayat-e-Ummat, Sabid Tulba Ki Tanzeen, Isla-e-Mashra, Fargen-e-Jamaat, Khidmat-Khalaq and Quran Foundation. It also mentions Juhapura Youth Federation (Gujarat), Kurwai Sports Welfare Academy (MP) and Khizentul Kutubul Islamia (Karnataka) as Simi fronts. Rejecting any linkages with the Simi, Khair-e-Ummat Trust secretary Ibrahim Khalil Abdi told DNA that they were engaged in providing scholarships, medical facilities and awareness campaigns about government schemes. “Those running the trust are reputed persons.” “Our chairman Abdul Gani Attarwala is aged nearly 80 and vice-chairman Ali M Shams is also around 70. It is a big joke to link us with Simi,” says Abidi. He claimed their trust was registered with the government and even granted IT-exemption. Further, the government document says the Simi activists have managed to enter political parties for putting pressure on government to lift ban.  Moreso, it sympathisers of the SIMI from Jamia Millia Islamia, Hamdard University and JNU had arranged a meting in Delhi in December 2011 pledging they would do anything to get the Babri Masjid reconstructed at the very site. Further, the three day convention of AIMPLB is scheduled to discuss Muslim responses to right to education, direct tax code, legacy rule in agricultural property and the latest government decision on registration of marriages.

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http://twocircles.net/2012apr21/host_mumbai_convention_aimplb_front_simi.html#comment-215273

Host of Mumbai convention of AIMPLB a front of SIMI?

By Abu Zafar, TwoCircles.net,

New Delhi: Many of the participants of the ongoing convention of All India Muslim Personal Law Board in Mumbai may not know that the Khair-e-Ummat Trust, whom they were asked to contact is one of the “fronts/pseudonymous organizations of SIMI” if Central Government is to be believed. In fact, even the office bearers of the Khair-e-Ummat Trust are unaware that Union Home Ministry has listed them as a front organization of banned SIMI.

The letter issued by Maulana Syed Nizamuddin, General Secretary, All India Muslim Personal Law Board asks the invitees to contact the reception committee at the Khair-e-Ummat Trust’s office upon reaching Mumbai on April 20.

When Haroon Mozawalla, General Secretary of Khair-e-Ummat Trust, was contacted by the TCN, he expressed his surprise and said that he was not aware of any such accusation. He also said that he was neither contacted nor given any notice by any government authority.

“We are an independent trust and working in educational field since last 13 years and we don’t have any link with SIMI,” Mozawala told TCN.

According to the website of the Khair-e-Ummat Trust, it is involved in providing educational assistance, scholarships and financial helps to poor patients, admitted in various government hospitals in Mumbai.

The background note of the sixth ban on SIMI submitted by the Central Government to the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Tribunal headed by Justice V.K. Shali alleges, “There are over three dozen fronts/pseudonymous organizations of SIMI which are state specific and being used for carrying out its activities including collection of funds, circulation of literature, regrouping of cadres, etc.”

Khair-e-Ummat Trust has been listed as one such “front/pseudonymous organization” at serial number one under the head of Maharashtra. The background paper lists many other organizations in Kerala, Maharashtra, West Bengal, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka and Delhi.

The background note alleges that “SIMI regrouped its cadres and revived the organization through pseudonymous/front organizations, clandestine meetings and circulations of leaflets, posters and magazines.”

The total number of such alleged front/ pseudonymous organizations is 51 out of which four organizations have been alleged to function at all India level while remaining have been stated to be state specific. The background note gives names of such organizations.

Links:
http://khaire-e-ummat.org/

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http://www.firstpost.com/politics/why-indian-muslim-politics-is-about-to-change-forever-280746.html

Why Indian Muslim politics is about to change forever

by R Jagannathan



Apr 19, 2012

Political parties created of, by and for Muslims in India will be the defining trend of the current decade. This will change Indian politics forever.

If the politics of the last 30 years was defined by the creation of caste-based parties comprising various strands of OBCs and Dalits – which branched out from mainstream political parties in many states – the second decade of the 21^st century will see Muslim parties seeking to discover their own power of agency.

Reuters

On Thursday, The Times of India reported from Mumbai that on 1 May Muslims in Maharashtra will announce the formation of a new political party for motives that go no further than “service” to the community.

Quoting Salim Alware, a member of the still-unnamed Muslim party’s core committee, the newspaper reports: “Muslims count 20-30 percent in over 60 districts and in a few districts they are even around 40 percent. Yet, there are just 11 Muslim MLAs in the current assembly. Our interaction with masses in 21 districts so far gives us hope that an alternative political platform in the state is possible.”

This development should not be read in isolation, for there has been a deep realisation among Muslims that most political parties have stopped at symbolism in supporting their causes.

The recent Uttar Pradesh election saw the rise of the Peace Party of India (which won four seats). The last two Assam assembly elections saw the rise of the All-India United Democratic Front (AUDF, which won 18 assembly seats), and in Tamil Nadu there is the Manithaneya  Makkal Katchi, a political front of the activist Tamil Nadu Muslim Munnetra Kazhagam (TMMK), which won two assembly seats in alliance with the AIADMK in the 2011 assembly elections

This does not add up to great political clout, but to this motley group must be added the traditional Muslim parties with strong, regional  pockets of influence – the Indian Union Muslim League (in Kerala), which has always been part of the regional power structure, and the Majlis Ittehadul Muslimeen (in Hyderabad).  When Telangana is formed, MIM will be more than a handful in that new state.

The impact of the Muslim parties is clearest in Kerala and Assam – where they command real power by being among the top three parties in terms of seats or vote shares.

The parties in Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and the still-to-be-formed one in Maharashtra are nowhere near able to flex their muscles, but one thing can be said with some certainty: they are on their way. It may take all of this decade for them to build their political muscle and assembly strengths and meaningful coalitions, but it is more than likely to happen.

The central logic of this development is this: Muslims are the only social group in India who are still to discover their power of agency. Every other caste or religious group either has its own party, or wields real power inside traditional parties.

What is surprising is that Muslims took so long to realise that none of the political parties really gives them the kind of real representation and share of power despite their huge share of the national population (around 14 percent).

One may question the need for a religious-identity based party for Muslims in secular India, but the obvious truth is that our secularism is a superficial, where all the mainstream parties have given Muslims little more than token representation. Muslims have not prospered in any state run by a “secular” party, whether it is UP, Bihar or even Communist West Bengal. This suggests that even secular parties are at the core “communal”. (Read the Sachar report, which documented the status of Muslims, here).

While it is not surprising that a so-called Hindu party like BJP does not give Muslims their due, the Congress, the Communists and various regional parties do not do that either.

The tragedy of Muslim politics in India has been that after partition, Jawaharlal Nehru’s secular politics drove Muslims towards the Congress, but once Nehru disappeared from the scene, the Congress policy towards Muslims was reduced to running a protection racket for the community without giving them real economic benefits. Congress politics was reduced to courting the most sectarian and reactionary of Muslim leaders, to the irritation of the Hindu elite.

In other words, the Congress practiced its own brand of minority vote-bank politics, and periodic communal rioting all through the sixties and seventies and eighties helped herd frightened Muslims towards the Congress during election time – to the detriment of their economic prospects. The worst Gujarat riots took place not under Narendra Modi, but in the late 1960s, when the BJP did not exist.

The first to break away from the Congress brand of umbrella politics were the other backward castes (OBCs, in UP, Bihar, Tamil Nadu), followed by the Dalits under Kanshi Ram and Mayawati.
The Congress, an unstated coalition of upper caste, Muslim and Scheduled Caste and Tribe voters, did not deliver the results to the latter three. This is what prompted Kanshi Ram to launch his Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) to consolidate the Dalit vote and identity over the long term. In Mayawati, the Dalits finally discovered their true power of agency – their right to represent themselves and look after their interests.

The rise of Congress vote-bank politics in the 1960s and 1970s gave the BJP (formerly Jana Sangh) hopes of creating its own Hindu vote-bank on the rebound. For a while, during the Ayodhya movement and after 2002 in Gujarat, this vote-bank almost came into being. But a Hindu vote-bank that groups all castes under one banner was always an unlikely prospect – as the creation of several caste-based parties in the Hindi heartland and in the south shows.

The fault-lines in caste will ensure that there will be no monolithic Hindu party or vote-bank, and the same could be true for Muslims, too. In the initial phase of the re-discovery of identity politics as a tool of social and economic empowerment, Muslim parties may be more regional than national in character.

While it is difficult to predict how this will reshape Indian politics over the coming decade or two, one thing is clear: Muslims will no longer be willing to play second fiddle to the parties they so far voted for, whether it is the Congress, the Samajwadi Party, the Rashtriya Janata Dal of Lalu Prasad, the Communists, or Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress.

Indian politics over the next decade will thus evolve to take one or two forms: coalitions of caste- and religion-based parties both at the centre and states, or much higher representations for communities in the mainstream political parties.

The BJP victory in Goa was largely the result of the latter idea. The party’s decision to give tickets to more than half-a-dozen Catholics party tickets was what brought it to power. It cannot now go back to Hindutva – though it can certainly claim to represent Hindu interests and negotiate with those who represent Catholic ones.

Politics in the country will thus have to follow the Kerala model (where each community – Muslims, Christians, Ezhavas, Nairs – has its own party) or the UMNO model of Malaysia, where the coalition will always be headed by the Muslim United Malays National Organisation, with the Chinese and Indian populations having their own parties as junior – but powerful – partners.

This, in fact, opens up possibilities for parties like the BJP, which can now woo Muslim or caste-based parties on the latter’s own terms. However, tokenism is not going to work. The BJP’s Hindu character – which it cannot deny – is currently a weakness because this places it squarely in the sectarian camp.

An alliance with, say, a Muslim party or a Dalit party (as recently happened between the Shiv Sena-BJP and the Republican Party of India – worked out on the basis of power-sharing and an agreed approach to policies, could convert this weakness into a strength. A Hindu party aligned with Muslim and Dalit parties could be a potential winner since it would not then be seen as communal. (The paradox: When the entire coalition is communal, it is secular)
The liberal ideal may be to have political parties that represent economic or social ideologies, where communal identities do not matter in governance.

But India is not currently headed that way. Till we reach a minimum level of economic and social inclusion, the best we can hope for is a genuine coalition of castes and communities.

An emerging coalition of regional Muslim parties is the missing link that will complete the picture in this decade.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mumbai/Muslim-group-to-float-party-on-May-1/articleshow/12724397.cms

   | Mumbai

Muslim group to float party on May 1

Mohammed Wajihuddin, TNN | Apr 19, 2012, 03.38AM IST

MUMBAI: Dismayed at their continued under-representation in parliament, state assembly and municipal corporations, a group of Muslims in Maharashtra have decided to float a new political party.

To be formally launched on May 1 (Maharashtra Day) at an auditorium in the city, the party is being presented as a "formidable" Muslim-Dalit alliance and an alternative to the Sena-BJP-MNS, Congress-NCP and SP. A retired police officer who claims that he will not fight elections himself will head the party.

The party's 12-member core committee (its name will be announced at the launch) comprises academicians, social activists, Urdu and Marathi journalists, retired cops and bureaucrats and other professionals who have declared no motives other than "service" to the community.

"Muslims count 20% to 30% in over 60 districts and in a few districts, they are even around 40%. Yet, there are just 11 Muslim MLAs in the current assembly. Our interaction with masses in 21 districts so far gives us hope that an alternative political platform in the state is possible," said educationist Salim Alware, a member of the core committee. Other members of the core committee include well-known educationist Mubarak Kapdi, RTI activist M A Khalid, senior Urdu journalists Khalil Zahid and Sarfraz Arzoo, Mumbai Aman Committee's chief Farid Shaikh. The Dalit group is being led by Marathi journalist Baban Kamble.

Dismissing the argument that a separate Muslim party will only strengthen the saffron alliance, Khalid said: "Muslims have been threatened with this argument for too long. Whichever party gets maximum votes of the Muslims, it comes to power. Now, we want levers of power in our own hands." He added that, although Muslims count around 14% in Maharashtra, there is not a single Muslim Lok Sabha member from the state.

"One Muslim (Hussain Dalwai) has been nominated to the Rajya Sabha, but he has no following at the grassroots. There is a consistent attempt to show that Muslim candidates don't win elections and therefore not many Muslims are fielded as candidates in elections," said a former Muslim Congress MLA.

http://www.dnaindia.com/money/interview_reverse-innovation-is-not-optional-it-is-oxygen_1676369-all

‘Reverse innovation is not optional. It is oxygen’

Published: Monday, Apr 16, 2012, 9:20 IST
By Vivek Kaul | Agency: DNA 

 

Vijay Govindarajan is the Earl C. Daum 1924 Professor of International Business and the founding director of Tuck’s Centre for Global Leadership. VG, as he is popularly known, is an expert on strategy and innovation. He was the first professor-in-residence and chief innovation consultant at General Electric. He was ranked #3 on the Thinkers 50 list of the world’s most influential business thinkers. In this interview to Vivek Kaul, VG talks about the concept of ‘reverse innovation’ and his eponymous new book Reverse Innovation: Create Far From Home, Win Everywhere (co-authored with Chris Trimble and published by Harvard Business Review Press). Q: What does the term reverse innovation mean? How did you end up coining the term? A: Historically, multinationals innovated in rich countries and sold those products in poor countries. This makes sense. After all, the United States and Germany have well over three hundred Nobel Prize winners in science and technology. Meanwhile, India and China, with six times the combined population, have fewer than ten. And consumers in rich countries can pay for innovative products. So, it is logical that innovation should flow from the rich world to the poor. Something strange is happening, of late. Innovations are flowing in the opposite direction. Innovations are flowing from the poor countries to the rich. This is the essence of reverse innovation.It is about innovating in poor countries and bringing those products into rich countries. My co-author, Chris Trimble, coined the term. Q: In the first chapter of your book, you talk about the American drink Gatorade as an example of reverse innovation. Can you talk the DNA readers through that example? A: Gatorade is an example of reverse innovation. The inspiration for Gatorade, the Godzilla of sports drinks, came from an unlikely source: Bangladesh. There was an outbreak of cholera in Bangladesh in the 1960s (the country used to be called East Pakistan in those days). Cholera causes diarrhoea resulting in severe dehydration. The Western doctors who went to help the victims were surprised that locals were giving a drink containing carbohydrates to treat diarrhoea. The concoction included ingredients such as coconut water, carrot juice, rice water, carob flour, and dehydrated bananas. At the time, Western medical opinion held that putting carbohydrates in the stomachs of patients suffering from diarrhoea would cause cholera bacteria to multiply and the disease to worsen. Yet, the local treatment worked. Q: Why did the treatment work? A: As Dr Mehmood Khan, chief scientific officer of PepsiCo (which now owns Gatorade) puts it, “by giving carbohydrate and sugar in the solution with salt, uptake was quicker, and patients rehydrated faster”. The success of the treatment was covered in the British medical journal Lancet, and it made its way to a doctor at the University of Florida.The doctor saw a common problem in the need for rapid re-hydration. If such a treatment worked well for cholera patients, it would surely work for healthy football players. Q: And what happened after that? A: Around that time, the University of Florida athletics department was looking for ways to get their football players quickly rehydrated. The research labs of the University of Florida came up with a concoction of water, glucose, sodium, potassium, and flavorings. The tasty cocktail sped the replenishment of the electrolytes and carbohydrates (just as was the case with diarrhoea patients in Bangladesh) that players lost through sweat and exertion. Gatorade took its name from the Florida Gators, the football team of the University of Florida. Q: And this was reverse innovation? A: Yes. The Gatorade story was unusual for its era. It ran counter to the dominant innovation pattern. Innovations typically originated in rich countries and later flowed downhill to the developing world. Gatorade, by contrast, swam against the tide. It was a reverse innovation. Q: What would be some of the earliest examples of reverse innovation? A: I already gave you the story of Gatorade which was an example of reverse innovation that happened in the 1960s. Chicken tikka masala became the #1 favorite food in UK in the 1990s — an innovation from India. If you want to go much before in time, I would single out yoga. Yoga was an Indian innovation thousands of years ago. Americans embraced yoga in the early part of the 20th century as they were seeking ways to control stress. Yoga has created a slew of new businesses in the US: instruction classes, DVDs, books and even clothes. Lululemon Athletica, a Canada-based company, started to sell yoga gear about 15 years ago. The company has a market capitalisation of $10 billion today. Q: Despite these early examples, you suggest that reverse innovations have been rare historically. A: Yes, this is a relatively recent phenomenon. Why? First, as long as the rich countries were growing at healthy rates, multinationals were satisfied to focus on satisfying needs of rich-world customers. Post-2008 financial crisis, growth has significantly slowed in developed countries. Multinationals are therefore forced to look for other avenues for sustained growth. Poor countries offer a significant opportunity. After all, over 5 billion live in poor countries — they represent a huge customer base. But to capture that opportunity, firms must innovate since middle-class consumers in emerging markets are fundamentally different from the middle-class in the rich-world. Second and more importantly, only in the past decade, local firms from developing countries have started to become global rivals. Emerging giants from India (Infosys, Tata, Mahindra & Mahindra), China (Haier, Lenovo, Huawei), Brazil (Embraer) and Mexico (Cemex) have global aspirations. Therefore, ignoring emerging markets can cost multinationals more than a missed opportunity abroad. It can open the door for local firms from the developing world to inflict pain or even severe damage even in multinationals’ well-established home markets. This possibility inevitably draws multinationals into the reverse innovation game. Q: Can you give us a few examples to show that the scene on reverse innovation is changing now? A: Oh sure. PepsiCo drew upon local teams and global resources to develop Aliva, a new savory cracker created by Indians to satisfy the Indian consumers, but with potential to appeal to a wider global palette. In China and India, Harman designed from scratch a completely new automobile infotainment system for emerging markets with functionality similar to their high-end products at half the price and one-third the cost. It has generated more than $5 billion from the new business around the globe. Q: Any other examples? A: GE innovated a portable ultrasound machine for rural China for $15,000 which has generated over $250 million of global sales.Indian farmers cultivate on small pieces of land. Deere developed a small 35 horsepower tractor customised for such lots. In India, tractors often do double duty, both working the farm and providing family transportation. Customers therefore value low price and fuel efficiency — two characteristics on which Deere’s new tractor excelled. Deere has now designated India as the global centre of excellence for small horsepower tractors. Q: What is glocalisation? How does in help the process of reverse innovation? A: Most global companies recognise that emerging markets have become today’s last source of growth. But all they do is modify and export products that they developed in their home country. This is “glocalisation” — a strategy bound to under-deliver. To capitalise on the full potential of emerging markets, they must head in the opposite direction — by innovating specifically for and in developing countries to create breakthroughs that will be adopted next at home and around the globe. Q: Any examples? A: When the giant big-box retailer Wal-Mart entered emerging markets in Central and South America, it discovered that it couldn’t simply export its existing retail formula. It needed to innovate. Specifically, its big box had to be radically scaled down. The company created a version of the Wal-Mart store similar to the more “cozy” retail outlets common in Mexico, Brazil or Argentina. Smaller stores thrive in those places because shoppers typically lack the liquidity to buy in bulk and maintain a home “inventory.” Moreover, consumers not only don’t drive SUVs, they often ride bicycles, mopeds or buses — or else they walk — to do their shopping. There are limits to what they can carry home. Small Wal-Marts matched the needs of the local culture. Q: But how is this a reverse innovation? A: Today, Wal-Mart is doing something that would have been hard to imagine just a few years ago. It is bringing the “small-mart” concept back to the United States. For one thing, its big-box market is saturated. Many US consumers suffer from big-box fatigue. Furthermore, dense urban environments, with constrained space and ultra-high rents, can more easily — and profitably — support numerous small stores distributed around town instead of one or two that are the size of a full city block. A variant of the same logic applies in very sparsely populated rural areas, where a big box simply couldn’t thrive. Wal-Mart will be a powerful rival to small-box competitors, in that it still enjoys vast economies of scale in purchasing and supply chain management even with a small store footprint. Q: You talk about Narayana Hrudayalaya Hospital performing world-class open heart surgery for just $2,000. This price — 90% to even 99% below rich-world’s comparables prices — can this become a reverse innovation? A: Narayana Hrudayalaya Hospital does open heart surgery at a fraction of the cost of what it takes in the US. This difference cannot be explained by differences in labour costs. It is pure and simple innovation. They have taken the manufacturing sector’s principles that have been around since Ford’s Model T —standardisation, specialisation of labour, economies of scale and assembly line production—and applied them to healthcare. For instance, they buy the same world-class equipment you will see in Mayo Clinic (one of the best hospitals in the United States) but they use it 20 times more. That drives the cost per unit down. They are now building a 2,000-bed hospital in Cayman Islands (60-minute flight from Miami) to serve American patients. This is classic reverse innovation. Q: Any other Indian companies doing reverse innovation? A: In 1994, Mahindra and Mahindra (M&M) arrived on American shores. The company, founded as a steelmaker in 1945, had entered the agriculture market nearly 20 years later, partnering with International Harvester to manufacture a line of sturdy 35-horsepower tractors under the Mahindra name. These tractors became very popular in India. They were affordably priced and fuel-efficient, two qualities highly valued by thrifty Indian farmers, and they were sized appropriately for small Indian farms. Mahindra figured its little red tractor would be perfect for hobby farmers, landscapers and building contractors. The machine was sturdy, extremely reliable and priced to sell. With a few modifications for the US market — such as super-sized seats and brake pedals to comfortably accommodate larger American bodies — Mahindra was good to go. Q: And this became a reverse innovation? A: Yes. Mahindra had developed a high-quality, low-horsepower, low-cost tractor for the Indian market. They took that product and created the “hobby” farming segment in the US. This is a segment which uses the tractor not for earning a living but for enjoyment. This is reverse innovation par excellence. Q: What do you mean when you say that “the new reality is that the future is far from home”? A: It is simple. If multinationals have to remain competitive , they must be just curious about the problems of customers in poor countries as they are about the problems of customers in rich countries. Q: What makes you say that “reverse innovation is not optional. It is oxygen”? A: If multinationals do not practise reverse innovation, local companies will and use those innovations to disrupt multinationals in their home markets. This movie has played before. Japanese automakers disrupted the Detroit Big Three during the 1970s and 1980s. Reverse innovation is not optional. It is oxygen. Q: What is the central message of your book that has just come out? A: We have three important messages: 1 Capturing opportunities in emerging markets requires innovation. 2 Local companies in emerging markets are best positioned to do such innovations. After all, who understands local customers better— local companies or multinationals? 3 Local companies can use such innovations to launch global strategy. Vivek Kaul is a writer and can be reached at vivek.kaul@gmail.com

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