Who's in India? Hu is in India!
Chinese dictator Hu Jintao just today concluded a four day visit to India. Throughout the four days of his summit, Tibetans in exile protested across the country targeting Hu Jintao in their demonstrations. And with good reason, Hu Jintao was the leader of the Tibetan "Autonomous Region" in the late 1980s when China brutally put down some protests there.
In any case, the protests were widespread across India from Bangalore to New Delhi to Bombay to Darjeeling. I drove past a site of protest in Bangalore on Nov 21 and decided to stop and explore it further. Unfortunately, I did not have my camera with me and whatever I did capture was with the primitive camera and video recorder that my phone here possesses.
I stuck around the scene of the protest for about 45 minutes during which time the protesters raised slogans against China and Hu Jintao and the protest was forcefully ended by Bangalore police who broke it up. I was both heartened and disappointed by the protest, as I'll explain now.
I was heartened to see the protest because it stood as a symbol of India's vibrant democracy as well as India's commitment to human rights.
One of the police officers went up to the lead Tibetan protester and from what I could hear of their conversation, which was in English, it went like this:
Police: You will have to end this protest and disperse now.
Protester: Why should we disperse now?
Police: You had taken out permission to conduct this protest today until 2 p.m. and now it is 7 p.m. You can come back take permission again and come back tomorrow, but you have to leave now.
Protester: Why should we come back tomorrow? Why can't we have permissio now to continue the protest?
Police: (inaudible) ... You cannot occupy this public area now without permission. You must vacate this place. Come back tomorrow if you want with fresh permission.
Protester: You say we are occupying this area. China is illegally occupying Tibet without permission. We are saying they should vacate Tibet!
What that last sentence of the protester had to do with anything, I have no idea. Anyway, failing to convince the protesters to disperse peacefully, the policemen charged the crowd beating them with lathi sticks and hauling them into the police van, which newspaper and media photographers had a field day with the drama that was unfolding. I didn't take too many videos because I didn't want the police damaging my phone (they confiscated a Tibetan's camera as he was taping, although they returned it about 15 mins later since they have no legal right to take it). The police van was filled and in the time a new one came, some protesters gathered themselves in a corner and continued to shout slogans against Hu Jintao and China. I didn't stay till the end, but from seeing all the debris left behind (plastic water bottles, cardboard signs, etc), there was going to be a lot of work for the Bangalore Mahanagara Palike the next day.
Towards the end, I was disappointed with the Tibetans' behavior and felt it marred an otherwise powerful protest. We in India are not their enemies. In fact, India has given them refugee status and many of them that are born in India have the option of accepting Indian citizenship, although they have been asked not to by the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan Government-in-exile for fear of diluting the Tibetan cause.
The Tibetan Government-in-exile itself is given a more or less free reign in India, including the power to collect annual taxes from Tibetan refugees living in the country. The least the Tibetan protesters could have done was to respect the law of the land. Ideally, in a democracy, protests should be allowed anywhere, anytime. However, in the interest of maintaining law and order as well as security, many free nations require protesters to take permission for protests, which will be assigned a time and a place. India is no different.
The Tibetan protesters had a permit to protest all of Nov 20, which they did. On Nov 21, they had taken permission to protest until 2 p.m., according to the police. They stayed on five hours past their permission and refused to move, instead bringing up an inane attempt at an analogy for the Chinese occupation of Tibet to justify their presence. When they did finally leave / were removed, they left a big mess. In my opinion, it was an abuse of India's freedoms. Of course, everyone in India abuses Indian democracy in similar manners (such as an unpermitted protest involving the Communist Party of India-Marxist's CITU Autorickshaw Drivers Union that blocked and caused a major traffic jam in a busy area of the city today).
Nonetheless, had the Tibetans peacefully dispersed taking their refuse with them leaving the intersection as it originally was and returned the next day with fresh permission, they would have garnered all the more of the public's, including my own, sympathy.
Of course, there could be reasons that I do not know about, such as Indian police not giving permission to the protesters for political reasons and India and China get increasingly chummy with each other, but that did not seem to be the case here, since the policeman invited the protesters back the next day. Instead of winning the hearts of Bangaloreans, the Tibetans' actions led to one of the policeman say to the laughter of an assembled crowd, "Illi bandu jagala madthare. Namma awurige jaga illa", which in Kannada means, "They come and create a ruckus here. We don't even have space for our own people." Indians by and large are sympathetic to the Tibetan cause, but that doesn't mean we'll condone everything even as blatant disrespect is shown for the law of the land.
On a final note, I found it somewhat ironic that the Tibetans were protesting against cultural genocide in Tibet, of which a major component is the suppression of Tibetan language by Chinese people. A report commissioned by the Tibetan Government-in-exile found:
"It was noted that very few Chinese in Tibet could speak Tibetan. Even those who were born in Tibet or had lived there for many years, rarely spoke Tibetan. Those who did speak Tibetan had extremely limited language skills. From conversations with Tibetans and Chinese on this subject, it was learned that Chinese and Tibetans believe that it is not necessary for Chinese living or working in Tibet to be able to speak Tibetan. Urban Tibetans on the other hand, need to learn Chinese in order to be able to function fully in their own urban society. In one Chinese restaurant on the Beijing Donglu, the mission tried to order food in Tibetan, but the Chinese waiters and waitresses were unable to understand. After several minutes a Tibetan girl working in the kitchen was asked to translate for the mission from Tibetan into Chinese. However, her command of Chinese was not sufficient for this task. As some of the staff spoke fluent English, orders were then taken in English. The Tibetan girl told the mission she was from a rural area and had recently started her job in the Chinese restaurant. When asked how much she earned per month, she answered she was rather uncertain about this. After her first month she had received RMB 300 while her colleagues earned around RMB 1000 a month. When asked why there was a difference between her salary and those of her colleagues, she answered that she did not know as her Chinese was not good enough to ask for an explanation. It was clear that the girl was severely handicapped by not being able to speak and understand Chinese sufficiently."
What appeared as ironic to me is that the Tibetans were shouting slogans in English and Hindi, imposed by North Indians as the "national language" while no slogan was raised in Kannada, the local language spoken in Bangalore. Of course, while the situation in any southern Indian state is nowhere near as bad as that of Tibet, north Indians in southern India do exhibit many of the characteristics that Chinese exhibit in Tibet, with many of them not knowing the local language even years after living here and believing it is their God-given right that everyone in India be able to understand and speak to them in their own language.
But I'm going somewhat off topic here. And before I end this post, one final note. I was surprised and angered by the Indian government's decision this time to confine radical Tibetan independence activist Tensing Tsundue to Dharamshala this year so that he wouldn't "embarrass" the Indian government.
In the past, Tsundue has carried out dramatic protests such as unfurling the Tibet flag across from the hotel where the Chinese leadership is staying in India and the like. It was also unfortunate that the Indian government has decided to restrict Tibetans' movements in India and keep them out of sight of the Chinese dictator as he toured India. In addition, China has requested and India has agreed to "not allow Tibetans living in the country to engage in anti-China political activities from Indian territory."
I fully agree with a recent editorial in The Times of India that said:
"New Delhi has officially accepted China's occupation of Tibet, but it has no business to demand that all sections of civil society toe the line."
In concluding this blog post, I would like to remind both the Chinese and Indian governments that India is a democratic society where many citizens can and often will have views that sharply different from the government, and we will make every effort to express those views in public. Meanwhile, I would like to urge the Tibetans to respect the law of the land and disperse peacefully when their protests end rather than fighting with police. If you want to fight, please do so against the People's Liberation Army. Trust me, by protesting responsibly, you will win a lot more people to your cause, which ultimately is a righteous one.
In any case, the protests were widespread across India from Bangalore to New Delhi to Bombay to Darjeeling. I drove past a site of protest in Bangalore on Nov 21 and decided to stop and explore it further. Unfortunately, I did not have my camera with me and whatever I did capture was with the primitive camera and video recorder that my phone here possesses.
I stuck around the scene of the protest for about 45 minutes during which time the protesters raised slogans against China and Hu Jintao and the protest was forcefully ended by Bangalore police who broke it up. I was both heartened and disappointed by the protest, as I'll explain now.
I was heartened to see the protest because it stood as a symbol of India's vibrant democracy as well as India's commitment to human rights.
- The Tibetan flag, which if flown within Tibet will get you imprisoned and tortured by Chinese authorities, fluttered proudly in Bangalore as it was waved by a Tibetan protester. The Tibetan flag is one of my favorite flags, in my opinion it looks absolutely beautiful, and to see it being waved around proudly always does my heart good. It represents the struggle the Tibetan people face in their quest for a basic human right, the right to self-determination and the right to freedom. When I visited a Tibetan store in Berkeley, CA about a year ago (almost to the week), I tried to procure a Tibetan flag to hang in my living room, but he didn't have any more left.
- There were plenty of placards all around denouncing China for burying nuclear waste in Tibet and warning of dire consequences regarding China's military expansionist ambitions showing a red China stretching across Asia including half of India.
- An animated Tibetan youth led a candlelight protest for Tibet and rallied the group by shouting catchy slogans such as
- "Who's the murderer? Hu Jintao! Who's the killer? Hu Jintao! Who's the torturer? Hu Jintao!"
- "Free (crowd screams Tibet!)! Free (crowd screams Tibet!)! Free (crowd screams Tibet!)!"
- "Tibet ki aazadi, Bharat ki suraksha" which is Hindi for "Tibet's freedom, India's security" and makes the point that India would never have to spend hundreds of millions of rupees in militarily protecting an Indo-Tibet border.
- "Hu Jintao kutta, maro jutta!" which roughly translates into "Hu Jintao is a dog, pelt him with shoes".
- "Long live the Dalai Lama, free the Panchen Lama!" (the Panchen Lama was abducted by Chinese authorities when he was a toddler and he and his parents have not been since. The Communist junta has installed a fake Panchen Lama of its own (don't ask me how a supposedly atheist government decides where a Buddhist monk has been reincarnated).
One of the police officers went up to the lead Tibetan protester and from what I could hear of their conversation, which was in English, it went like this:
Police: You will have to end this protest and disperse now.
Protester: Why should we disperse now?
Police: You had taken out permission to conduct this protest today until 2 p.m. and now it is 7 p.m. You can come back take permission again and come back tomorrow, but you have to leave now.
Protester: Why should we come back tomorrow? Why can't we have permissio now to continue the protest?
Police: (inaudible) ... You cannot occupy this public area now without permission. You must vacate this place. Come back tomorrow if you want with fresh permission.
Protester: You say we are occupying this area. China is illegally occupying Tibet without permission. We are saying they should vacate Tibet!
What that last sentence of the protester had to do with anything, I have no idea. Anyway, failing to convince the protesters to disperse peacefully, the policemen charged the crowd beating them with lathi sticks and hauling them into the police van, which newspaper and media photographers had a field day with the drama that was unfolding. I didn't take too many videos because I didn't want the police damaging my phone (they confiscated a Tibetan's camera as he was taping, although they returned it about 15 mins later since they have no legal right to take it). The police van was filled and in the time a new one came, some protesters gathered themselves in a corner and continued to shout slogans against Hu Jintao and China. I didn't stay till the end, but from seeing all the debris left behind (plastic water bottles, cardboard signs, etc), there was going to be a lot of work for the Bangalore Mahanagara Palike the next day.
Towards the end, I was disappointed with the Tibetans' behavior and felt it marred an otherwise powerful protest. We in India are not their enemies. In fact, India has given them refugee status and many of them that are born in India have the option of accepting Indian citizenship, although they have been asked not to by the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan Government-in-exile for fear of diluting the Tibetan cause.
The Tibetan Government-in-exile itself is given a more or less free reign in India, including the power to collect annual taxes from Tibetan refugees living in the country. The least the Tibetan protesters could have done was to respect the law of the land. Ideally, in a democracy, protests should be allowed anywhere, anytime. However, in the interest of maintaining law and order as well as security, many free nations require protesters to take permission for protests, which will be assigned a time and a place. India is no different.
The Tibetan protesters had a permit to protest all of Nov 20, which they did. On Nov 21, they had taken permission to protest until 2 p.m., according to the police. They stayed on five hours past their permission and refused to move, instead bringing up an inane attempt at an analogy for the Chinese occupation of Tibet to justify their presence. When they did finally leave / were removed, they left a big mess. In my opinion, it was an abuse of India's freedoms. Of course, everyone in India abuses Indian democracy in similar manners (such as an unpermitted protest involving the Communist Party of India-Marxist's CITU Autorickshaw Drivers Union that blocked and caused a major traffic jam in a busy area of the city today).
Nonetheless, had the Tibetans peacefully dispersed taking their refuse with them leaving the intersection as it originally was and returned the next day with fresh permission, they would have garnered all the more of the public's, including my own, sympathy.
Of course, there could be reasons that I do not know about, such as Indian police not giving permission to the protesters for political reasons and India and China get increasingly chummy with each other, but that did not seem to be the case here, since the policeman invited the protesters back the next day. Instead of winning the hearts of Bangaloreans, the Tibetans' actions led to one of the policeman say to the laughter of an assembled crowd, "Illi bandu jagala madthare. Namma awurige jaga illa", which in Kannada means, "They come and create a ruckus here. We don't even have space for our own people." Indians by and large are sympathetic to the Tibetan cause, but that doesn't mean we'll condone everything even as blatant disrespect is shown for the law of the land.
On a final note, I found it somewhat ironic that the Tibetans were protesting against cultural genocide in Tibet, of which a major component is the suppression of Tibetan language by Chinese people. A report commissioned by the Tibetan Government-in-exile found:
"It was noted that very few Chinese in Tibet could speak Tibetan. Even those who were born in Tibet or had lived there for many years, rarely spoke Tibetan. Those who did speak Tibetan had extremely limited language skills. From conversations with Tibetans and Chinese on this subject, it was learned that Chinese and Tibetans believe that it is not necessary for Chinese living or working in Tibet to be able to speak Tibetan. Urban Tibetans on the other hand, need to learn Chinese in order to be able to function fully in their own urban society. In one Chinese restaurant on the Beijing Donglu, the mission tried to order food in Tibetan, but the Chinese waiters and waitresses were unable to understand. After several minutes a Tibetan girl working in the kitchen was asked to translate for the mission from Tibetan into Chinese. However, her command of Chinese was not sufficient for this task. As some of the staff spoke fluent English, orders were then taken in English. The Tibetan girl told the mission she was from a rural area and had recently started her job in the Chinese restaurant. When asked how much she earned per month, she answered she was rather uncertain about this. After her first month she had received RMB 300 while her colleagues earned around RMB 1000 a month. When asked why there was a difference between her salary and those of her colleagues, she answered that she did not know as her Chinese was not good enough to ask for an explanation. It was clear that the girl was severely handicapped by not being able to speak and understand Chinese sufficiently."
What appeared as ironic to me is that the Tibetans were shouting slogans in English and Hindi, imposed by North Indians as the "national language" while no slogan was raised in Kannada, the local language spoken in Bangalore. Of course, while the situation in any southern Indian state is nowhere near as bad as that of Tibet, north Indians in southern India do exhibit many of the characteristics that Chinese exhibit in Tibet, with many of them not knowing the local language even years after living here and believing it is their God-given right that everyone in India be able to understand and speak to them in their own language.
But I'm going somewhat off topic here. And before I end this post, one final note. I was surprised and angered by the Indian government's decision this time to confine radical Tibetan independence activist Tensing Tsundue to Dharamshala this year so that he wouldn't "embarrass" the Indian government.
In the past, Tsundue has carried out dramatic protests such as unfurling the Tibet flag across from the hotel where the Chinese leadership is staying in India and the like. It was also unfortunate that the Indian government has decided to restrict Tibetans' movements in India and keep them out of sight of the Chinese dictator as he toured India. In addition, China has requested and India has agreed to "not allow Tibetans living in the country to engage in anti-China political activities from Indian territory."
I fully agree with a recent editorial in The Times of India that said:
"New Delhi has officially accepted China's occupation of Tibet, but it has no business to demand that all sections of civil society toe the line."
In concluding this blog post, I would like to remind both the Chinese and Indian governments that India is a democratic society where many citizens can and often will have views that sharply different from the government, and we will make every effort to express those views in public. Meanwhile, I would like to urge the Tibetans to respect the law of the land and disperse peacefully when their protests end rather than fighting with police. If you want to fight, please do so against the People's Liberation Army. Trust me, by protesting responsibly, you will win a lot more people to your cause, which ultimately is a righteous one.
posted by Vivek at 6:57 AM
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