NEW DELHI: Iqbal Masud, a leftist Muslim columnist, waiting in Pioneer says that the middle class in India is speedily being pushed towards a fascist state, He sees close linkage among human rights, secularism and democracy. A situation is developing all over the world where the ruling classes arc under pressure of International public opinion. This opinion is not a product of neocolonial hypocrisy but contains a strong clement of popular and youthful idealism, That is why German voluntary organizations criticized the decision to make immigration laws tougher. Similarly there was widespread revulsion in the west against attacks on Muslims after December 6, a development that was not properly projected by the Indian Press. In India, on the other hand, human rights activism is sought to be diffused by ploys like human rights commission or the commissions for Spore firing and Bombay riots. The fight against “terrorism” and “fundamentalism” has become a substitute for a de cent human approach to rights, In the process both administration and the police are getting communalized, How else to explain the kneejerk reaction to the slightest criticism of our right record? The commentator further notes that President Clinton’s pressure on China has borne fruit only in one respect release on parole of prodemocracy prisoners in Beijing three years before time. “A single swallow perhaps. Even that has not happened in India despite Malott’s much criticized remarks.

Article extracted from this publication >>  June 4, 1993