BASAS ANNUAL CONFERENCE

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1998 BASAS Annual Conference

17-19 April 1998
Centre for the Study of Globalisation, Euro-Centrism and Marginality (CGEM),
University of Manchester, Manchester, UK

This year’s annual BASAS Conference was held in Manchester and was hosted by Centre for the Study of Globalisation, Eurocentrism and Marginality (CGEM). The papers presented at the conference as usual came from a variety of disciplinary backgrounds, but despite the diversity of disciplines an effort was made to focus on two main issues confronting South Asia(ns) and South Asian Studies: the critique of Indology and globalisation and its consequences

The conference began with a panel dedicated to looking at issues arising from the critique of orientalism and Indology. This, however, was not the only place where the epistemological status of South Asian studies was discussed. Many of the presentations were suitably self-reflective about their methods and approaches to the study of South Asia and South Asians both in their contemporary and historical forms.

Many of the panels in the conference were devoted to an analysis of the effects of globalisation - in its broadest forms - on South Asia. Panels focusing on the nation-state, its limitations and political economy all addressed the impact that global forces (both centrifugal and centripetal) have on political, economic and cultural structures of South Asia.

The conference was well attended and many South Asianists used the occasion to re-subscribe to BASAS. Apart from the academic presentations there was also time for some socialising with a reception on the Friday evening, followed by a party on Saturday night. Here, the President and Membership Secretary of BASAS distinguished themselves by leading the festivities with some funky dancing.

The success of the conference depended upon the support and assistance of a number of people including: Nasreen Ali, Hatoon Al-Fassi, Bilal Anwer, Luca Brusa, Pandeli Glavanis, Sameera Mian, Navtej Purewal, Laura Turney, Imran Tyrer and the staff of Chancellors Conference Centre.

Dr Bobby Sayyid, Department of Sociology, University of Manchester, Manchester M13 9PL, UK. Tel: +44-(0)161-275-2461 | Fax: +44-(0)161-275-2514 | Email: bobby.sayyid@man.ac.uk

Panels & Abstracts

Indology, Orientalism & South Asian Studies

1. Mark Bevir, University of Newcastle, ‘In Opposition to the Raj: Annie Besant & the Dialectic of Empire’

   This paper uses the example of Annie Besant to explore, in the context of the critique of Orientalism and Indology, the relationship between imperial and nationalist narratives of Indian history. When Besant landed in India she disavowed all political intent, but she soon became a militant nationalist, indeed, the only western woman ever elected President of Congress. We can explain her politics by tracing the way her secular and socialist heritage informed her intellectual challenge to the authorising discourse of the Raj, that is, how radical discourses from the Imperial centre helped to structure her nationalism. In Britain, Besant’s theosophy constituted an alternative religious discourse that combined aspects of the secularist critique of Christianity with a defence of eastern religions. In India, it acted as a religious and social discourse that asserted the legitimacy, even the superiority, of the indigenous culture; thus, it led to a historiography, and analysis of the current plight, of India which challenged the ruling discourse of the Raj and inspired various nationalists. More generally, this study of Besant illuminates the logic of a narrative of India shared by many nationalists. It shows how this narrative arose in dialectical opposition to the legitimating discourse of empire.

2. Richard King, University of Stirling, Scotland., ‘Orientalism & Indology in a Postcolonial Era’

   This paper provides an overview of the contemporary issues and debate involved in the critique of ‘Oriental Studies’ initiated by the publications of Edward Said’s 1978 classic Orientalism and it relevance to the discipline of Indology. A brief examination of the debate between Edward Said and David Kopf over the nature of the Orientalist enterprise will be followed by a discussion of contemporary developments, refinements and critiques of Said’s basic approach, particularly within the field of Indology (e.g. Ronald Inden, Homi Bhabha, Peter van der Veer, Willhelm Halbfass, the Subalternists etc).

   Some time will be spent discussing the question of the adoption of poststructuralist theories to questions of representation (e.g. in the works of Michel Foucault, Hans-Georg Gadamer, Talal Asad and Ronald Inden). Does the anti-foundationalism of post-structuralist theory undermine postcolonial and subaltern attempts to construct an ‘authentic’ representation of South Asian culture? Finally, the paper will consider the contemporary quest for a ‘post-Orientalist’ discourse as scholars of South Asian religion and culture attempt to re-invent the discipline of Indology in a postcolonial era.

3. Jacqueline Suthren Hirst, University of Manchester, ‘It’s Raining’ ‘I Used to Think That Can a White Female Indologist Speak?’

   Unless we can find a way to acknowledge the myriad and convoluted balance of subjective and social payments instituted by imperialism, to talk of the possibility of opposition without requiring proof of absolute purity or absolute oppression and without resorting to blaming and silencing, we will not be able effectively to shift the discursive paradigms that structure our existence (Reina Lewis, 1996: 240).

   Like Lewis’ book, my paper is intended as a contribution to this debate. In it, I shall raise the following questions:

   • Who, in the context of this conference, might the ‘we’ be?
   • How has Indology contributed to the complex and fractured identity of that ‘we’?
   • Do ‘we’ want to shift the way ‘our’ experience is structured and, if so, how?

   Initially, I shall take the ‘we’ in the simple collective sense of those attending this year’s BASAS conference. I shall pursue the second question by considering briefly three examples from Sanskrit-based Indological studies which, in my view, show how such studies have shaped or attempted to shape knowledge which impinges on key questions of South Asian identity. My examples will be:

   • (i) the ways ‘Indian philosophy’ has been constructed in the twentieth century;
   • (ii) the ways anthropologists studying gender issues in India have (mis)used the Samkhyan model of purusha (monadic consciousness) and prakrti (the mental-material) (e.g. Wadley, 1988, cf Contursi, 1996); and
   • (iii) ways in which the concept of dharma (‘cosmic order’, ‘duty’, now ‘religion’) has been used in boundary formation in both past and present.

   I shall try to demonstrate that Indology is negatively implicated in each of these examples to a greater or lesser extent, but not just so, and that, given that this is the case, Indological studies can and must continue to play a positive critical role at the end of the twentieth century.

   This requires my proper not superficial recognition that issues of power, objectification of others and the ‘Other’ and cultural plundering have been and remain central (against the subtext of MacKenzie, 1995). However, I wish to reject the dangerous dichotomising which can be a consequence of such a stand in favour of a complexity which does not seek to mask the underlying issues. I experiment with a contemporary reading of the eighth century Advaitin Shankara which deconstructs objectifying I-You relationships and ask how recent feminist discussions of ‘difference’ and going beyond difference for the sake of action against injustice (Maynard 1994, Brah 1996) may be applicable in future South Asian studies. I draw on a recent conference on Dowry (SOAS November 1997), co-organised by the International Society against Dowry and Bride-Burning and by the Gender and Dharma Working Group of the Dharam Hinduja Institute of Indic Research in the UK, before opening my final question and paper for discussion.

(Re)Presenting South Asia

1. Rupa Huq and Jatinder Barn, University of East London, ‘Goodness Gracious: The place of the UK South Asian Diaspora in Post Colonial New Britain’

   Cool Britannia, re-branding Britain: what lies behind the terms? Empty spin-doctored hype or a serious attempt to challenge outmoded notions of Britishness based on warped images of imperial grandeur? This paper will attempt to examine where the people of the Diaspora thrown up by Britain’s South Asian colonial past belong in Blair’s New Britain at this juncture of the dying days of this (Christian) century and new millennium. To what extent does the Blairite project symbolise a break with past patriotic paradigms? What of the use of union jack imagery, the British bulldog and the reinvention of Enoch Powell as ‘a great man’ (as Blair put it). We will examine the newfound visibility of Asian youth via fora such as ‘Goodness Gracious’ (televised second-generation comedy) and Cornershop (first ‘out’ Asian band at number one in February 1998) to situate them in the Blairite ‘New Britain, Young Britain’ rhetoric. Above all we will attempt to uncover whether in these polyvocal discourses, history is repeating itself, being made or being re-written. Old debates, we will contend, are not necessarily tired old debates.

2. George Gheverghese Joseph, University of Manchester, ‘Infinite Series across Cultures - Background, Motivation and Diffusion’

   Two powerful tools contributed to the creation of modern mathematics in the seventeenth century: the discovery of the general algorithms of calculus and the development and application of infinite series techniques. These two streams of discovery reinforced each other in their simultaneous development because each served to extend the range of application of the other.

   The origin of the analysis and derivations of certain infinite series, notably those relating to the arctangent, sine and cosine, was not in Europe, but an area in South India that now falls within the state of Kerala. From a region covering about five hundred square kilometres north of Cochin and during the period between the 14th and 16th centuries, there emerged discoveries in infinite series that predate similar work of Gregory, Newton and Liebniz by three hundred years.

   There are several questions worth exploring about the activities of this group of mathematicians/astronomers, apart from technical ones relating to the mathematical content of their work. In this paper we confine our attention to (i) the social background and motivation underlying their interest in this crucial area of mathematics; considered in a cross-cultural context by comparing it to similar work that emerged in Europe during the seventeenth century and in China during the eighteenth century; (ii) A critical review of explanations that have been offered for the appearance of such ‘advanced’ work in a small area in Kerala by different groups (notably, the Eurocentrists and the Revivalists); and (iii) The beginnings of a theory of diffusion of these mathematical ideas from India to Europe through the Jesuits and other external agents.

3. Tasleem Shukar, University of Lancaster, ‘Bengali Films’

Home and Away - The South Asian Diaspora

1. Roger Ballard, University of Manchester, ‘Traditions of Being Sikh’

2. Alina Mirza, Department of Health Promotion, Glasgow, ‘Ethnicity: Infinite Divisions’

   Ethnicity is derived from the Greek word ethnos, meaning ‘a people or a tribe’. It has been used to imply ‘shared origins or social background; shared culture and traditions that are distinctive, maintained between generations, and lead to a sense of identity and groups; and a common language or religious tradition’.

   Try applying this to real people. Who am I, born in Punjab, of a Kashmiri father and an Afghan mother? I might define my ethnicity on the basis of common language, culture and upbringing as Punjabi. I have sympathies with the Kashmiris and the Afghans in their struggles. Yet my loyalties lay with Pakistan and intrinsically with my Pakistani friends and relatives. Now I am settled in Scotland and am sharing the culture and language of Scottish people. My passport says that I am a citizen of the European Economic Community. I am told that my skin colour is, white. How does all of this define - or re-define - my race, ethnic background and ethnicity? What space do I fill in the census? Am I a Pakistani, a white Asian, a Punjabi, a Kashmiri/Afghan mix or a Scottish Muslim? What is my identity - or do I need a single identity in order to ‘belong’ to a place and feel ‘proud’ of my origins?

   The above account highlights how difficult it is to define one’s own ‘ethnicity’ let alone that of a population. Ethnicity is a social construct. In Public Health (a scientifically oriented branch of medicine), we are required to describe differences in people’s experiences of health and health care through the very narrow social funnel of ‘ethnicity’. It has become the scapegoat for ‘race’. Biological explanations of health and behaviour have been replaced by social phenomena such as culture and language. However, the prejudices continue. In Public Health as in any speciality of medicine, there is a need to recognise the ‘bias’ which is associated with anything ‘different’ from the dominant culture. The study of an ethnic group, e.g. ‘Indian Sikhs’ in Scotland, has different implications than a study of ‘Scottish Catholics’ as an ethnic group living in India. The nature of the relationship of these two ethnic groups to the majority population is entirely different in the context of the historical and political past of colonialism, imperialism and the continuing situation of new-colonialism, neo-imperialism and ‘internal colonialism’. The ethnic minorities in the UK have health needs which are compounded by the effects of racism, ethnocentrism and xeno-centrism. Research undertaken into any aspect of ethnic minority groups should take this into consideration.

3. Dhooleka Sarhadi Raj, University of Cambridge, ‘When Being Hindu Punjabi Doesn’t Matter: An Ethnography of Racism’

   Race relations have often been overlooked in anthropological works on Asians in Britain: indeed some writers (Modood 1985) have challenged the utility of such concepts, denying that they can fruitfully contribute to such discussions (recent works such as Baumann 1996 and Gillespie 1995 mention race, but do not detail its significance). Taking up this challenge, I propose to explore issues of racism for Hindu Punjabis in London. But I do not wish to present a straightforward catalogue of incidents regarding housing, economics, or physical violence. Instead, I will examine how ‘Asian’ and ‘Black’ as nominal identities are understood and experienced. The changing experience of racism (specifically the rise of the so called ‘new racism’, which replaces ‘cultural difference’ for ‘race’) is explored through contrasting the experiences of the parental generation with that of their children. The first ethnographic section presents the parents’ experiences and responses to racism. How has experiencing racism changed their strategies for living in Britain, and, one could argue, their understandings of ethnicity? I then consider the British born generation’s experiences, paying particular attention to the ways in which their approach differs. The chapter ends with a discussion of the significance of ‘nominal identity’, a product of the ‘new racism’, and its implications for a discussion of culture and community in which the terms ‘Black’ and ‘Asian’ (which necessarily imply heterogeneity), are rejected in favour of a religious, specifically Hindu, identity (thereby seeking fixity).

De-forming the Nation State

1. Katharine Adeney, London School of Economics, ‘Unity Through Power or Diversity? Challenges to the (Nation) State in India & Pakistan’

   Since Independence, India and Pakistan, products of the same colonial regime and institutions, have experienced markedly differing degrees of success in dealing with movements which have challenged the authority of the state. Whilst both states have experienced insurgency movements, mainly in their border regions, Pakistan has lost territory (Bangladesh), whilst India has acquired some (Goa & Sikkim). In itself this is unproblematic, and partially to be expected, given the geographical non-contiguity of Pakistan before 1971. However, India has a larger territory to control, and is also much more heterogeneous than Pakistan. It has substantial religious and linguistic groupings, and its possible dominant ethno-national group - the Hindu community - is divided into caste and linguistic groups. Pakistan, in contrast, has had a powerful centre, often controlled by the military, and dominated by one ethnic group, the Punjabis. The rationale behind its creation - premised upon the right of an Islamic ‘nation’ control its own state - also pointed to a unity of direction and purpose throughout the whole state. Therefore, what has enabled the Indian State to manage its diversity more successfully than Pakistan? There are many possible explanations for this, four of which are detailed below. First is due to the fact that India has maintained a democratic regime for all but two years since Independence, whilst Pakistan has fluctuated between democracy and military rule. Second is that the Indian State maintains control with an iron fist, and is institutionally more stable than Pakistan. Third is that the existence of a dominant group at the centre restricts the ability of the state to accommodate its ethnic minorities. Fourth is that India’s and Pakistan’s differing federal structures, premised on very different notions of nation-building have influenced the two state’s abilities to manage their ethno-national groups. Due to its neglect in much of the literature, it is this fourth explanation which will be concentrated on.

2. Haider K. Nizamani, Islamabad Institute of Strategic Studies, ‘Limits of Dissent: A Comparative Study of Anti-Nuclear Weapons Voices in India & Pakistan’

   Dissenting voices within the nuclear discourse in India and Pakistan have remained of marginal interest to the security analysts of South Asia. Barring the nuclear hawks’ contention in both countries that such voices are either echoes of foreign interests or expressions of strategic naivety, there is little by way of disinterested analysis regarding the potential and predicaments of nuclear doves in the subcontinent. This paper intends to fill that lacuna by analysing the nature and direction of the nuclear dissent in India and Pakistan.

   A comparative study of the nuclear dissent will serve two purposes. First, assess the potential of these voices to influence the nature and direction of the nuclear discourse in the subcontinent. Second, explain the reasons behind the limited success such voices have had so far and their possible role in the future.

   By analysing the issue of the nuclear dissent with the help of the methodology of Critical Security Studies, this paper will situate the matter in the broader context of the dominant security discourses in India and Pakistan. By employing the notion of discourse - systematic sets of statements which give an expression to the meanings and values of an institution, and define, describe and delimit what is possible to say and not possible to say with respect to the area of concern to that institution - I attempt to demonstrate how dissenting voices are marginalised and ostracised by the adherents of the dominant security discourses.

   Anti-nuclear weapons voices within India and Pakistan envisage security needs of their respective countries in diametrically different terms that proponents of the dominant discourse. By analysing closely the key assumptions and arguments of nuclear dissidents, I will be able to show why the dissent in its present form is unlikely to wield any ground in the present day nuclear discourse either in India or Pakistan. Such a study will also help us to realise the limits of the Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) and Track-II diplomacy in the Indo-Pak context.

3. Mohammad Waseem, University of Oxford, ‘Politics in Pakistan: Postcolonialism & After’

   Politics of Pakistan and other South Asian Countries during the half-century after independence has been generally analysed in the framework of postcolonial state, especially in terms of institutional and constitutional traditions inherited from the colonial state. While scholars on the left of the political spectrum focused on the military-bureaucratic establishment, those on the right generally concentrated on constitutional development, patterns of leadership and ideological movements as the right kind of material for political analysis. However, the explanatory potential of the model of the postcolonial state for Pakistan at the end of the 20th century can be questioned on various grounds. For example, the emergence of ethno-nationalist movements have challenged the nation-state.

   Political violence has acquired a recurring pattern. In public perception, the function of the state as a provider has been overtaken by its function as a regulator. It can be argued that the institutional-constitutional framework of the postcolonial state was cut off from its natural source of moral and philosophical inspiration at the time of independence. In the subsequent decades, party politics, electoral dynamics and the pattern of governance based on patronage rather than policy together brought about what can be termed indigenisation, ruralisation and ideologisation. In this context, one can question the prevalent preoccupation with state-centred models of analysis in a society which is undergoing rapid attitudinal changes through the expanding outreach of the media, geographical mobility in the form of urbanisation and migration, and marketisation of values in general. There is need to go beyond postcolonialism in order to explain politics of contemporary Pakistan. One must take into account the massive societal input in the state system during the five decades after independence which is characterised by ethnic revival and Islamic reassertion as well as general dissatisfaction with the performance of the state

4. Furrukh Khan, University of Kent, Re-calling Traumas: Memory, Violence and the Oral Narratives of Partition

   A vast majority of narratives of Partition of India have not been articulated for the general audience for a number of reasons, one of which has been the sheer difficulty of articulating what people have felt regarding emotionally exhausting traumas associated with the loss, not only of physical property but of the physical violence and the utter brutality of it. The second major obstacle has been the lack of effort on the part of the government of Pakistan to encourage victims to talk about their experiences by providing a forum where they can come together to discuss the events of their past. Pakistan, as in a number of post-colonial nations, has tried to put the process of nation-building as their most immediate aim, and somehow, the activity of re-calling the past has been considered to be a regressive activity. This relegation has actively discouraged especially the women from talking about their pasts in order to come to terms with them. The third factor which has contributed to this deliberate silence has been the social standing of most of the people who suffered most during the Partition; they have belonged to the relatively poorer classes and non-literate, which has created the difficulty of actually presenting their experiences in written form.

   My paper will highlight the silences which have surrounded this national tragedy of both nations. This paper presents the issues raised by the victims in their own words, of their stories and the impediments they have had to endure in talking about their dis-location and violence. I also hope to raise questions about the ‘Other’ communities who carried out these acts of deliberate and vicious violence just because the victims belonged to a particular religion, even though they shared common bonds of language and similarities regarding a number of social and cultural traditions. I would also raise the questions of how people view their ‘Others’ after more than fifty years have elapsed since Partition. The issue of the perpetuators of crimes will also be discussed in this paper.

   I will also discuss the difficulties that one faces in this research-process of collecting oral narratives of Partition. Another potential difficulty is the cultural and religious reluctance of establishing a dialogue between the sexes, which is also one of the reasons for lack of forums to discuss the painful events from the Past.

   In my paper, I plan to examine how ‘Selective’ memory of Partition is different in the State’s rendition and those of individuals. As Partition, more often than not raises painful issues of cataclysmic violence, a large number of incidents where people from different religious groups were able to help and shelter people from the minority, are often overlooked. I hope to raise some issues as these which do not conform to the prevalent re-construction of events of fifty years ago.

   My paper has a number of specific aims, the most important of which is to provide an opportunity to the victims of the events of Partition to narrate their own stories in the manner and language they feel most comfortable with. The second objective that I hope to achieve, is to provide a forum in which stories of individuals are more important than religious affiliations they may have, for such an effort will counter the parochial viewing of the ‘Other’ by each community which in turn, allows for simplistic and unquestioning stereotypes. Lastly, I hope to highlight ‘lessons’ learnt from the narratives from different individuals regarding this terrible trauma which continues to haunt not only the individuals and communities but the two nations as well, and who continue to revel in hatred and distrust of each other rather than establishing a dialogue to exorcise this nightmarish Past.

Globalisation and South Asia

1. T.G. Arun, University of Manchester, ‘Privatisation in South Asia: Experiences of India & Pakistan’

   In this paper, we examine the Privatisation programmes of India and Pakistan in the broad spectrum of their past development experience particularly in the presence of complex social and political relations between various pressure groups in these countries. Until the early 1990s, Indian development policy was largely based upon policies of import substituting industrialisation in the context of a mixed economy with a large public sector. After the initial concentration of public sector investment in major infrastructure areas, public enterprises began to spread into all areas of the economy including non-infrastructure and non-core areas. This has resulted in poor general overall performance of the public sector, which has manifested itself in low or negative returns to public investment. In short, the public sector had lost its rationale as an engine of growth and the growth of the public sector had become an end in itself, absorbing half of the total industrial investment regardless of the low returns on such investment. In this context, the new government has introduced series of economic reforms including policies of liberalisation, deregulation, dis-investment and privatisation since 1991. Privatisation in India was conceived as a part of the broader process of structural adjustment and perceived to threaten the material interests of politicians, organised labour, and civil servants.

   In Pakistan, public sector enterprises hold a significant position in economic activity. But to achieve industrialisation, the Pakistan initially stressed the encouragement of protected private entrepreneurship for the task of industrial development of the economy. Until 1991, there has not been any serious attempt to reform loss making public enterprises and they continue to provide ‘pressure groups’ with the resources to distribute in terms of jobs, funds, status and allowed them to regulate a wide range of activities. The public sector enterprises had not grown to the extent to fill the basic rationale behind their establishment. Like in India, privatisation process had started in Pakistan since 1991. One of the objectives of the privatisation policy in Pakistan is the improvement in economic efficiency. In order to lead the privatisation with long-term economic growth, privatised companies should be run efficiently and thus achieve improvement in business performance. Unlike in India, the Privatisation Commission in Pakistan is a statutory one and chooses companies to be privatised, evaluates assets and acts as a window for calling for bids by the private sector.

   The period prior to 1991 in both countries was associated with high levels of bureaucracy and associated problems of rent-seeking behaviour. Domestic manufacturers benefited from high levels of protection from external markets and industrial production was characterised by entry-exit barriers in product and factor markets. The sections of the private sector who have benefited from the previous strategy, will not be obvious proponents of undoing the public enterprises nor of shifting to export led strategies. Privatisation will thus mean not only the transfer of assets but forcing the existing private sector to become lean and mean. In contrast, those that may benefit from the privatisation programs are not easily identifiable and thus not well organised. There is an argument that the complexities of issues constituting the broad parameters of structural adjustment makes it unlikely that privatisation process will be linear.

   In all economies, privatisation/dis-investment policies raise important issues relating to the appropriate size and role of the public sector, the balance between state and market and the very objectives of development itself. More than this, the social problems arising from privatisation can undermine the credibility of the process leading to costly social conflicts and waste of human and capital resources. It is therefore essential that social considerations occupy a central place in the design and implementation of privatisation policies. In India and Pakistan, these appear to be particularly intransigent issues, an explanation for which can only really be found in a political economy analysis of these countries with respect to dominant classes in the society. The paper examines the relevance and possible threats to privatisation policies in these two countries, in the complex economic and political situation of South Asia.

2. Sagarika Dutt, Nottingham Trent University, ‘The City of Joy Revisited: The Effects of Economic Liberalisation on Calcutta’s Environmental Policies’

   Calcutta is one of the largest cities in the world with a population of 11 million. Built by the British more than three hundred years ago, this ‘post-colonial’ city is home to the genteel Bengali bhadrolok. But it is also a major commercial and industrial centre that has attracted migrants from other parts of India and refugees from across the border. My interest in Calcutta stems from the fact that I am a probashi Bangali, i.e. a Bengali who lives outside Bengal. I have, therefore, always been sensitive to the changes taking place in Calcutta for the better or the worse. Calcutta today, is an overcrowded, polluted and dirty city which is growing fast but is also trying to change its image both at home and abroad. Mother Theresa’s international fame for the good work she has done for the people of Calcutta, only serves to highlight the fact that some of the poorest people in the world live in Calcutta.

   In 1994, the Government of West Bengal issued a Policy Statement on Industrial Development, in response to the national policy of economic liberalisation (New Economic Policy, 1992). It focuses on stimulating growth through modernisation and improving incentives for investment. However, increasing the pace of industrial development is likely to put increasing pressure on the environment. In 1995, the Government of West Bengal issued its Policy Statement on Environmental Protection and Conservation of Natural Resources, the fundamental objective of which is ‘to reconcile pro-development and pro-environmental goals’. This paper examines the Calcutta Environmental Management Strategy and Action Plan which is a Government of West Bengal project but was prepared by an international team of British consultants, employed by the ODA, and Indian environmental specialists. The objectives of the report, which was submitted in February 1997, are to establish the need for and benefits of an Environmental Management Strategy (EMS) in the Calcutta Metropolitan Area; to provide through the EMS a framework for enabling sustained environmental improvements; and the means to develop stronger environmental decision-making processes at all levels.

3. Caroline Dyer and Archana Choksi, University of Manchester, ‘Globalisation & the Rabari Nomads of Kutch, Western India’

   As the Gujarat State rapidly industrialises to compete in a global market, almost every ‘development’ compounds the collapse of the nomadic economy. Where before nomads could survive on barter, they now need so much cash to pursue their traditional occupation that they have to seek alternative ways of generating it, within the market economy. Within the last 10-15 years, they have been forced to sell animals for human consumption. This compromises their religious beliefs and undermines the entire and long-standing ethical basis of animal husbandry as a holistic, moral economy. The homogenising norms of globalisation make it ever more difficult for groups, such as nomads, with fundamentally different premises of what a human life is, to exist; and this, in turn, poses a challenge to notions of sustainable and equitable human development in the context of globalisation.

4. Andrew Wyatt, University of Bristol, ‘Globalisation & the Indian Polity’

   This paper begins with an outline of a sceptical position, informed by the realist approach to international relations theory, that does not view the current process of economic change to be exceptional. It would be consistent with this position to argue that the current enfeeblement of the Indian polity is the consequence of endogenous factors. The paper goes on to argue that while this might, on prima facie grounds, be a plausible position to hold it understates the complexity of India’s interdependence with the global economy. A more accurate interpretation would hold that globalisation is an uneven process and that the Indian economy is in a fairly early stage of integration. Consequently the impact of globalisation on the Indian political system can be expected to increase as the process accelerates. In conclusion the paper predicts that political actors will have their autonomy sharply reduced in the medium term as the Indian government, unable to contain its fiscal deficit, is forced into a dependent relationship with its international creditors. Thus a transformationalist reading of the Indian situation is more accurate than a realist interpretation.

(En)Gendering South Asia

1. P. Raghuram and I. Hardill, Nottingham Trent University, ‘Diasporic Connections: Case Studies of Asian Women in Business’

   In this paper we use a case study approach in order to explore the ways in which diasporic connections are being used by four South Asian women entrepreneurs. These diasporic connections are being used to serve an emerging niche market for clothing that is defined by class and gender. The market niche exists as a socio-economic consequence of the variations within the Asian Diaspora in Great Britain (Ballard 1990: 247) and elsewhere. Recognition of this niche and the strategic use of diasporic connections has helped these four Asian women to become successful entrepreneurs. The women we interviewed are both constituents of, as well as re-inscribing their position within this differentiated Diaspora through their enterprise.

2. Shoba Arun, University of Manchester, ‘Gender, state & the development process’

   Several studies in feminist literature moot the assumptions of state neutrality, regarding gender. The state is assumed to have a responsibility for women’s interests, thus making it a locus of feminist efforts. However, far from having a degree of autonomy from patriarchy, feminist theories believe the state to be gendered, implicitly male biased. The extents to which state institutions are gendered in other words promote men or women’s interests will vary according to the gendered history and politics embedded in institutional rules and processes. The form of state response to women’s needs also depends on the gender construction of family and degree of gender polarisation in civil society and economy. States are involved in the social and political institutionalisation of gendered power differences by reinforcing women’s unequal position in families and markets by neglecting gender differential in terms of in inheritance rights, by tacitly condoning domestic and sexual violence, or by sanctioning differential wages for equal or comparable work.

   Kerala is an exemplar of development with enviable achievements in literacy (especially for women), health and demographic indicators. The gender relations are located within a complex domain of caste, kinship and structures of households, thus signifying varies roles for women. But, in a society characterised by vertical hierarchies of caste, gender relationships assume different forms within and across caste boundaries. The content of the discourse among women shifts perceptibility from the late 20’s with the posing of practical issues related to the improvement in the status of women in spheres of employment, education, legal rights and political participation. Previously gender relations were conditioned by a combination of contests for control within the household, over property and inheritance, unequal rights for both men and women and by the process of change in property relations, and other factors linked with emergence of new social classes, i.e. conflicts set in motion by colonialism, social reform and the nationalist struggle.

3. Shaminder Takhar, South Bank University, ‘Asian Women: Politicisation and the Construction of Identity’

   Discourses have constructed Asian women as a homogenous category and have imposed a collective identity. Through the production of an ethnocentric and sexist view of minority cultures, stereotypical images and myths surrounding the plight of the Asian woman have been circulated. Thus Asian women have been presented as victims of oppressive, archaic, religious and cultural systems (Amos & Parmar, 1984).

   To understand contemporary representations of Asian women, the paper will firstly draw upon oriental and colonial discourse to illustrate the formative role of the Other in the construction of Western national identities (Said, 1978). This is particularly relevant in the construction of women as different, exotic, inferior and as a site of contestation (Mani, 1990; Rajan, 1993).

   Secondly the paper attempts to examine the complexity of identity construction and will utilise research to explore Asian women’s understanding of themselves in a contemporary Western urban political context. It will explore the impact of factors such as ‘race’ and class, and the conditions in which politicisation occurs to challenge dominant discourses which portray Asian women as victims or lacking in agency.

Travel Worlds and Travellers Tales

1. John Hutnyk, University of Heidelberg and Virinder Kalra, CGEM, ‘South Asian Music Styles in Transnational Frame?’

   The emergence of another generation of cultural entrepreneurs cum brokers should be no surprise. Talvin Singh as maestro of Anoukha, DJ Ritu at Outcaste, and Bina Mistry formerly VJ and host of Zee TV’s chart show are only the latest in a cultural turnout that has made moderately successful careers in the Arts a possibility for a tiny minority of Black personalities. No longer are the cultural practices of people of colour presented routinely in anthropological formats, or as curiosity ‘ethnic’ documentary styles. Black and Asian culture is cool, loud and self-assertive. There are high flying personalities there to say so - just a few - but there are several other levels of cultural brokerage ranging from minor radio station spots to club and party organisers and the like, but generally it has become commonplace for the presenters of cultural difference to be able to claim some affinity with the ‘community’ which they represent. There still remains elements of that anthropological framing, but much of the cultural effervescence of ‘New Britain’ simply bypasses such arcane modes. So is everything gonna be OK in the new multi-culti world where self-representation and identity assertion is ‘in’?’

2. Michael Jauch, South Asia Institute, University of Heidelberg, ‘Manto’s odyssey’

   In this paper I try to approach the odyssey the Urdu short story writer Sada’at Hasan Manto (1913-55) experienced during the times of India’s partition following the year 1947, through a careful reading of some of his short stories, concentrating on the subtle transformations of Manto’s turbulent imagery into a literary language that opens itself to an aesthetics of the senses not only when violence is witnessed. The Issues raised in the discussion are related then to my attempts in constructing an imagery for artistic visual representation (film) based on some of Manto’s stories, within the context of ethnographic work in progress that focuses on the presence of partition in the everyday life of people living in Punjab.

3. Virinder Kalra and Sean McLoughlin, CGEM & Liverpool Hope University, ‘Discrepant Representations of Mirpur in Narratives of Migration, Diaspora & Tourism’

   This paper, based on work by Virinder Kalra and Seán McLoughlin and to be presented by the latter, begins on a bus with the authors talking with young British-Mirpuri-women travellers in Pakistan. The authors offer a critique of academic, media and social work conventions of understanding and representing diasporic Asian culture as derivative of its regional manifestations in the South Asian subcontinent. The sub-continent is commonly seen as the privileged place in which cultural keys to unlock Britain’s multi-cultural riddles are found. This effectively marginalises the position of minority groups in the UK with regard to constructions of citizenship, and assumes a highly problematic notion of ‘cultural dislocation’. The authors confound such simplicities by highlighting the multiple journeys and tropes of self-representation articulated in discussions amongst diasporic British-Mirpuri youth on their travels to, and in, Mirpur. The travel narratives of second generation British-Asians demonstrate the creative fusion of cultural reference points, rather than exemplify any entrapment between the ‘two cultures’ of East and West. Account is also taken of the representations of Mirpur and British-Mirpuris made by local Mirpuris themselves.

4. Tej Purewal, University of Manchester, ‘The Strut of the Peacock: Travel, Partition & the Indo-Pakistan Border’

   This paper, also co-written with Virinder S. Kalra, draws attention to the much celebrated fiftieth anniversary of the withdrawal of British colonising forces from South Asia. The paper looks not so much upon the moment of so-called ‘independence’, but instead on the on-going struggles for the independence and freedom of the mass of the peoples of South Asia that have been left behind by British colonial legacy. Independence from direct colonial rule and the partition of India into two countries, India and Pakistan, occurred simultaneously, making the recollection of 1947 a bittersweet memory. The paper aims to focus attention upon the significance of the border in relation to the movement, travel and communication of people in Punjab. It is the fact of partition which this paper focuses upon, though not on the large scale that it has often been talked about nor on the totally human level which has also attracted considerable attention. Rather, it takes a sideways glance, towards a specific location on the border dividing India and Pakistan, through the lens of travel and the focus of history. The subversive actions of people and symbolic gestures of both opposition to the border will be discussed as metaphors for new ways of theorising and conceptualising borders and travel.

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