Grassroots Activism And Digital Activism - Complementary To Each Other

Grassroots activists often look down upon and mock at digital activists.

I appreciate and respect the “hands on” approach of grassroots activists. Given the fact that it is they who actually run a movement on the ground, there is no doubt that they form the most vital part of a movement’s lifeline.

However, while taking justified pride in their role, they should also appreciate the significant role played by digital activists in bringing an issue to the world’s notice, thereby generating public support and sympathy in many parts of the world.

The fact is that grassroots activism and digital activism are complementary to each other. And it is only through a combined presence of the two that a movement can become most likely to be successful.

Digital activism can draw public sympathy and support for a cause, but that sympathy and support will wither away if there are no grassroots activists to tap that support and utilize it in furthering the movement on the ground.

On the other hand, if there is only grassroots activism and no digital activism, then those grassroots activists will have to fight for their cause without the world sympathizing with them and their cause. And in that case they will be deprived of a strong moral support that often plays a key role in a movement.

A Few Humble Suggestions To Ms Girija Vyas, President, National Commission For Women (India)

Dear Madam,

Your organization, National Commission for Women (NCW), is a significant and crucial body that is playing a very valuable role in upholding the cause of the respectable womenfolk of our land. It is courtesy the presence of NCW that a number of women from cross sections of the society are being able to fight against various injustices committed against them, thereby managing to safeguard the honour and dignity of their life. Every right thinking citizen of India appreciates the valuable service offered by NCW, and takes great pride in its presence on the Indian soil.

However, I sometimes feel that there are certain occasions when NCW might get vulnerable to misuse and misutilization, without even realizing it. Such incidents are sure to malign your organization, not withstanding its noble objectives.

If you do take it as an audacity, then I will like to present just a couple of humble suggestions which may help you to ensure that there is no misuse of your organization.


a.) NCW must ensure that on the occasion of a normal household arguement a lady can not blackmail her husband/in laws by flaunting her personal contacts with NCW officials and functionaries. I hope you will accept that it is not a good practice for a lady to make remarks like “I know Ms. XYZ of NCW. I will just call her tomorrow”, while having a somewhat normal argument with her husband/in laws.
b.) You must ensure that when a lady visits NCW office for some official or other work (and not to lodge any complaint), then she is not entertained to make any verbal complaint against her husband/in laws while having a casual chat with any NCW official. If she tries to do something like this, then the concerned NCW official must not entertain it. Rather she should tell that lady that if she really has a genuine complaint to make, then she is welcome to lodge a formal, written complaint with the appropriate person. Otherwise, that lady may later blackmail her husband/in laws by saying things like “Today I told Ms. XYX of NCW everything when I visited their office. She was very angry, and has said that she will ensure NCW takes strict action against you people”.
c.) When a lady lodges a complaint with NCW, then, after recording the complaint, NCW may do the following two things – c.) 1.) – It may verify the genuineness of the complaint before taking any action against the accused, And, c.) 2.) – Even after it finds that the incident mentioned in the complaint is true, it may try to find out the root cause, which eventually resulted in that incident. For example, NCW finds that a lady was indeed slapped by her husband as she has mentioned in her complaint. Now, before taking action against her husband, NCW may try to find out whether there was some very strong provocation from the lady which made her husband to slap her at the heat of the moment. It may have been so that the lady was abusing her in laws in a very offensive language, which made her husband lose patience (after all, he is a human being). Worse, it may have been so that the lady had pounced on her husband and was physically assaulting him, and the husband had to slap her back simply for self defence.



So madam, these were just a couple of suggestions that I dared to make, with this hope that the same might help NCW to be further effective in its actions. I again hope that you will not count my action as an audacity.

I want to highlight that my coming up with these suggestions does not mean that I have any doubt about the competence of NCW officials.

I will also like to highlight that I do not claim to have any personal experience as far as the situations/scenarios - that I have mentioned above as examples - are concerned.


Please accept my heartfelt respect and regards and share the same with each and every member of NCW. Please always be there and be a strong support for our mothers, sisters and daughters, who genuinely need your help. I wish you people all the best.

The Thrilling And Educative “User Testing” Event, Courtesy Teekha Web

As an Internet enthusiast, I will cherish for a long time the nice experience that I had yesterday (15th May 2011). So which experience am I referring to? Well, yesterday I had the opportunity to attend, and be part of, a “User Testing” event conducted by “Teekha Web”, the upcoming online solutions consultancy launched by a bunch of passionate and energetic Web enthusiasts, who eat, sleep and breath WWW.

The concept of “User Testing”, as they explained to me, entails conceptualizing and designing the outline of a web site by strictly keeping in mind the target user. Well, people may say that there is nothing unusual about it, as the target audience is kept in mind while preparing every web site. That is in fact one of the basic rules of web site preparation. True! But as a former content writer I know that this focus on target audience is given mainly while preparing the web site contents (such as text and its language, images and pictures, etc.). But usually not much focus is given on user friendliness in terms of “navigation designing”. It is very common for web site makers to forget to judge whether their web site is easy to navigate, where the user will be able to easily detect the appropriate links, before clicking on the same and accessing exactly those web site pages that contain the information/data that they are looking for.

And it is precisely this factor that is emphasized on in this “User Testing” concept. As per this concept, before actually getting into preparing the web site content, the content preparation team should sit together and conceptualize the web site home page through the eyes of the target audience. They will discuss among themselves (a la brainstorming) and try to identify each and every information/data that the target audience will like to have in the web site. And they will give equal focus on how the links to those data are to be put on the web site, so that the target audience has no problem in detecting/identifying those links and click on them. The basic tenet of the “User Testing” concept is that it is not enough to put necessary information/data in the web site. But you should also ensure it that the target audience has no problem in identifying the links to those data. If the links to those data get lost in the “jungle” of various confusing links, etc., and the target audience fails to access the information/data that they are looking for, then the presence of those information/data in the web site becomes meaningless, right?

I in fact had the “hands on” experience to be a part of this “User Testing” practice. I joined a team that was conceptualizing the home page of a hotel, and enjoyed the experience like anything. While it left me nostalgic by reminding me the experience I used to have as a content writer, I also enjoyed the thrill of learning a new but key concept of web site preparation.

I profusely thank “Teekha Web” team for the great experience (which was both educative and thrilling), and wish them all the best.

Apa Sherpa – A Steady “Climb” of “Himalayan Success”

The living “Everest Legend” Apa Sherpa has done it again. Boasting the record of scaling Mt. Everest for the most number of times in the world, this jewel of the respectable “Sherpa” community again climbed the world’s highest peak on May 11, 2011, for the 21st time. This time he scaled the peak as a member of Eco Everest Expedition 2011. Eco Everest Expedition 2011 is an initiative aimed at cleaning the litter at Mt. Everest that was left behind by earlier climbers. The initiative also focuses on generating mass awareness on the possible impacts of climate change.

Now in his early 50’s, this pride of the Asian mountaineering community scaled Mt. Everest for the first time in 1990. And then he made it his practice, eventually establishing himself as the man to scale the peak for more times than anybody else.

Apart from being a legendary mountaineer, Apa Sherpa also enjoys the honour of being Nepal’s ambassador to promote tourism. He is also the founder of Apa Sherpa Foundation, the organization which is dedicatedly working for providing better education to Sherpa children located in rural Nepal. The Foundation is also working for the preservation of Sherpa language and culture.


Please accept a bagful of heartfelt salutations, sir.

One Day The Entire World May Become A Single State

A time may come when the entire world will become a single state
And I have a feeling that one day it will happen, though the idea may sound absurd on today’s date.

There will be a single World Government, running the affairs of the entire globe
Spanning from Africa to America, and Asia to Europe.

There will be no “countries”, but only “administrative divisions”
And people will have no “nationalities”, as there will be no “nations”.

Every person will have only one identity – that he is a World Citizen
No matter originally which place he is from - the USA or India or Kenya or Yemen.

There will be no “international border”, as the entire world will be a single country
With various regions of the world being like the branches of the same tree.

There will be no war, as there will be only one country with not a second one to challenge its “territorial integrity”
And people across the world will enjoy a life of peace, harmony and unity.

The entire global fund will be spent on development, with not a single pie being wasted in war preparation
There will be no “war psychosis”, as that is impossible when the entire world has only one nation.

Words like “patriotism”, “nationalism” and “nationalist feeling” will be completely obsolete
And people will find such feelings to be ridiculously “parochial” and “narrow-minded”.

All the people across the globe will live as a single community
Working together for the world’s over-all development with dedication and integrity.

Just imagine what a beautiful place the world will be, if my dream becomes a reality
I know the dream sounds to be Utopian, but cannot we take at least some baby steps towards a Global Unity?

“Mukhtaran Mai Gang Rape Case” Verdict – The Pakistan Judiciary Makes A Mockery Of Itself

The Pakistan Supreme Court has made a shocking mockery of the entire Pakistan judiciary including itself, and certainly of justice as well, by acquitting all but one accused in the infamous Mukhtaran Mai Gang Rape Case.

A resident of Meerwala village in the Muzaffargarh district of Pakistan, Mukhtaran Bibi (now widely known as Mukhtaran Mai) was gang raped on the orders of a local tribal council of the Mastoi Baloch clan.

The harrowing incident was actually the final outcome of a series of incidents. It all began when Mukhtaran’s brother Shaqoor, who is from Tatla clan, was accused of having an affair with Salma (aka Nasim), a lady from Mastoi Baloch clan. This resulted in tensions as the Mastoi Baloch clan is more rich and powerful than the Tatla clan, i.e. the clan of Shaqoor and Mukhtaran.

However, the trial court came up with the verdict that there was no supporting evidence against Shaqoor’s “misdeed”. But as everybody knows that in Pakistan’s tribal areas Kangaroo courts are more powerful than formal judicial organs, Salma’s family decided to take the law in their own hands. They abducted Shaqoor, and got him sodomized. This now further resulted in a series of charges and counter-charges. And finally came that fateful day, when, empowered with the backing of a local tribal council, Salma’s brother Abdul Khaliq and his aides dragged Mukhtaran inside a stable and garg raped her for full one hour. And yes, that was not all. After that she was paraded naked in the village in full public view.

The hue and cry raised by the Pakistan media and civil society forced the government to initiate actions. The trial court came up with the verdict that the accused were indeed guilty, and awarded death sentence to them. But the accused appealed to the Lahore High Court, and the latter acquitted five of the six accused on the basis of “insufficient evidence”. It was in 2005.

Within days of the Lahore High Court verdict the Supreme Court of Pakistan took suo moto cognizance of the case. And on 21st April 2011, after 6 years, it has come with its loan awaited verdict which upholds Lahore High Court’s verdict – acquittal of all but one accused.

There is probably hardly any doubt that Mukhtaran Bibi will remember 21st April 2011 as a day equally “black” as the day on which she was gang raped by some beasts in the garb of human beings. On that fateful day she was raped by miscreants. And on the “Judgment Day” she found her hope for justice to be raped by the weak judiciary of her country. She had waited for 6 years to see those bastards finally getting punished for the heinous crime that they dared to commit. Instead, now she will have to bear the pain of watching them moving freely, an experience that will far aggravate the pain of bearing the memory of her harrowing experience.

It may have been so that the Judiciary did not have enough evidence to punish the accused. But would it have been so difficult for the honourable judiciary to gather some key evidences, if it were really sincere about it? And yes, what was the role of the investigating agencies? How could they fail to collect enough evidences given the fact that the crime was committed in full public view? Was it simply a case of professional incompetence? Or is it so that they were not serious about the investigation in the first place?

There should be immediate initiation of investigation to find out whether a section of the government connived with the accused. And, if anybody is found to be guilty, then he should be awarded with strongest possible punishment, which will act as a deterrent for other “potentially” erring government functionaries.

The Mukhtaran Mai gang rape case verdict will remain as a “black chapter” in the history of Pakistan’s judiciary. It is a different matter that the history of the said judiciary is already replete with a number of “black chapters”, and is likely to have more.

Congrats To Gujjars For “Simple Marriage” Resolution

It was really heartening to see how leaders of Gujjar community passed a resolution to keep marriage a low-key affair. The notable and praiseworthy resolution forbids vulgar show of wealth in marriages, while also prohibiting the use of guns and liquor on such occasions.

This is undoubtedly a pleasantly startling move, given the fact disturbingly ostentatious marriage ceremonies have now become so common in North India. People unhesitatingly use wedding ceremonies as a tool to display their money power, stooping to the level of competing with one another in terms of glitz and glamour. Under such circumstances it is not too much to say that this resolution of the Gujjar community leaders represents a ground-breaking move.

I also heartily appreciate the prohibition of use of gun in wedding ceremonies. This practice of gun firing, something so common in North Indian wedding ceremonies, is already frowned upon by a large section of the society. I regularly come across news of accidents (including fatal accidents) in wedding ceremonies resulting from gun firing. And therefore it is a welcome step in itself to ban the use of gun in Gujjar weddings.

A bagful of congratulations to Gujjar community leaders for coming up with this significant resolution. It is a powerful initiative to cleanse the rich North Indian culture of needless extravaganza. North Indian wedding ceremonies are quite glorious and colourful, and they do not need any “artificial” extravaganza to appear more glamorous. In fact, doing away with such extravaganza will help the North Indian wedding ceremonies to display their real self, which is a captivating combination of magnificence and liveliness.