[Urbanstudy] Re: Nangla Machi

[sebastian Rodrigues]

Dear Sanjay,

In response to Jeebesh you say the following towards the end "And finally, I 
think that the state is not 'out there', we are the state."  This 'we' 
includes who? the middle class? The Academicians who are not the survivors 
of disasaters such as you point out "communal violence, the Union Carbide 
disaster, gender violence, Emergency-related violence etc."? Do you believe 
in any boundaries between the State and Civil Society? If yes then where did 
your "we" fit in?.

I must admit while I question all this to you I am one of the survivors from 
one of the disasters related to mining where my home did rot in mining dust 
and I was not the State. Or was I? If yes then I acted violently against 
myself?

Seby.


>From: Sanjay Srivastava <sanjays at deakin.edu.au>
>To: urbanstudygroup at sarai.net
>Subject: [Urbanstudy] Re: Nangla Machi
>Date: Sat,  8 Apr 2006 10:33:16 +0530
>
>This is a response to Diya and Jibesh.
>
>Dear Diya,
>You ask why NM is an exception in terms of people not getting land (though 
>I
>hope this proves to be wrong). Frankly, it isn't clear why, though perhaps 
>it
>might be that the High Court and other authorities feel that Yamuna-related
>land  is so 'valuable' that whoever has 'encroached' upon it, deserves no
>mercy. The river itself has become an semi-religious entity superior to the
>humans rather than the both being a part of the urban cultural and 
>political
>economy. Of course, there is also the mass of influential 'public' opinion 
>that
>gathers around a mystical environmentalism within which the urban poor, at 
>the
>same time that they service the well-off are also hived off from their 
>lives in
>favour of a 'clean environment'.
>
>Secondly, the land at NM is owned by a number of different agencies, or, at
>least, more than one will be held financially liable if any resettlement 
>plan
>does come through. These have carried out their own surveys to see how many
>have settled on their patch of land and hence what their liability might 
>be.
>Quite clearly, they would be quite happy if no resettlement plan was ever 
>to
>come through. While on the hand the concretness of the state is manifest in
>ideas of statutory bodies and surveys (which will lead to specific 
>results),
>just as often the multiplicity of state procedures  and authorities can be 
>the
>black-hole where human aspirations disappear. The irony is that those who 
>stand
>to be most discriminated by the state often have the most (and are forced 
>to
>have the most) intense relationship with it.
>
>There are also rumours (and very much rumours) about the role of local
>politicians in all this.
>
>I don't know if any of the above is explanation for might happen to those 
>still
>there are Nangla, but perhaps others have different points of view.
>
>Regards,
>Sanjay
>
>Dear Jibesh,
>
>The question of 'distance' is an important one, and not one that can be  
>easily
>set apart by itself. Of course, it is true that in many senses I am, 
>indeed,
>distanced from the lives of those in Nangla. Perhaps similar to those 
>others
>like me who have not had to see their houses and shops being demolished. I
>certainly don't wish to (and didn't in my earlier message) wish to express 
>my
>own sense of 'anguish' and 'helplessness' as this can too easily position 
>an
>outsider as the one as the suffering one. There is enough of 
>anthropological
>and sociological empathy with the suffering subject around, and after a 
>point,
>it becomes self-serving. To suffer philosophically doesn't hurt nearly as 
>much
>as to suffer historically (or, 'actually').
>
>However, the question remains, how to, write from a position of relative
>privilege about those who may not be thus positioned. This, surely has been 
>the
>  situation in which virtually all Indian social scientists find 
>themselves,
>whether articulated or not. And, speaking for myself, I have certainly 
>learnt
>from the writings of those who have not themselves been the subjects of
>communal violence, the Union Carbide disaster, gender violence,
>Emergency-related violence etc.
>
>As for how 'administrative and state violence is lived', it should be clear 
>that
>my account is always going to be partial (and to some extent 'fictional', 
>ie.
>constructed out of fragments). But perhaps I share that with many others. I
>certainly have no sense that what I might have to say is going to be a 
>'better'
>one than some other. It definitely can not reproduce embodied suffering. 
>That's
>the proper limitation of all such work, one that can be undone by someone 
>else
>working in a different context.
>
>As should be clear from above, I am very wary of stating that I am ever 
>going to
>be able to 'properly' represent violence experienced by others; that would 
>only
>trivialise what has actually happened at Nangla. However, given these
>limitations, what can one do but work out some secon-hand strategy ( at 
>least
>for myself) of entanglement? An example, as inadequate as it may be. For 
>the
>past 3-4 months I've been involved in the case of an elderly man, a 
>resident of
>Nangla, who one afternoon, simply disappeared. He appears to have been very
>active in mediating between the Nangla people and, among others, the 
>police.
>And, and as far the Nangla people are concerned, he was quite fearless in 
>his
>dealings with the the latter. Many seem to think that he was kidnapped by 
>the
>police, and, since November 2005 nothing has been heard of him. To cut a 
>long
>story short, since then, a group of Nangla people and myself have met and
>visited police stations, Patiala House (courthouse), police officers (ACPs,
>SIs, ASIs, constables), lawyers etc. Eventually, this led to the filing of 
>a
>Right to Information (RTI) petitition, after further visits to the RTI 
>office,
>the police, etc etc. Now that Nangla is to be scattered, all this will 
>probably
>come to nothing, since residents may not be able to organise over the 
>issue,
>living in different parts of the city, or having to leave it altogether.
>Unfortunately, I can only narrate the complex violence of the state, 
>through
>trying to focus on its different sites (so what is happening at Nangla is 
>also,
>I feel, linked to urban 'movements' such as the Delhi govt. sponsored
>'Bhagidari'). So, my account (of the state, violence, whatever), is really 
>an
>attempt at distancing only in the most literal sense of the term: how does 
>one
>understand urban reality as a consequence of a number of related contexts,
>since actual violence is always born out of a wider and connected social
>context. And finally, I think that the state is not 'out there', we are the
>state. And if we have sense of 'state violence', we also have some sense of 
>our
>own those proclivities,attitudes, and desires. That's one of the ways I 
>hope to
>write about 'state violence', as different from the embodied violence
>experienced by those at Nangla. The two stories, as I am sure you 
>recognise,
>can't be the same, though hopefully they will not be seen as mutually
>exclusive, or, antagonistic.
>
>Best Wishes,
>Sanjay
>
>
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