How Dare You?

You – have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words, and yet I’m one of the lucky ones. People are suffering, people are dying. Entire ecosystems are collapsing. We are in the beginning of a mass extinction and all you can talk about is money and fairy tales of eternal economic growth. How dare you?
Greta Thunberg, UN Climage Action Speech, September 23, 2019

The first sailing ship to Gaza recently, ‘Conscience’, was bombed by Israel. It could not thereby sail with food and aid. In 2010, Israeli commandos killed 10 people on a Turkish ship, the ‘Mavi Marmara’; it was leading a small flotilla towards Gaza.

So where are they, 12 of them, bravehearts, Greta and her comrades?

Madleen, the Freedom Flotila, has been kidnapped by the killing machine of Israel. A picture shows an armed soldier with bread and water, with a defiant Greta, half-smiling, facing him.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said via a spokesperson that footage of the October 7, 2023  Hamas attacks will be screened for the Madleen crew after they reach Ashdod Port.

“Antisemitic Greta and her Hamas-supporting friends should see exactly what the Hamas terrorist organisation — which they came to support and act on behalf of — truly is,” he said. “They should see the atrocities committed against women, the elderly, and children, and understand whom Israel is fighting to defend itself.”

Born in Stockholm, she was first sensitized about global warming when she was just about eight. Reports say that she had bouts of depression when she was 11. Her father, Svante Thunberg, an actor, said:  “She stopped talking… she stopped going to school.” (BBC, May 9, 2024).

She was soon after diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome, a form of autism. Her mother, Malena Ernman, an opera singer, said she became “much happier” once she decided to engage with the issue. She said that she became a kind of “superpower” once she was diagnosed with autism. Being ‘different’ became a ‘gift’.

In August 2018, when she was 15, Greta skipped school and began a solitary protest outside the Swedish Parliament.  She held a placard which said, ‘Skolstrejk för klimatet’ (School Strike for Climate).

Her solo protest sparked a spontaneous movement — a global campaign on climate change — ‘Fridays for Future’. And who were her first supporters?

Enlightened students, including from schools, from across the world. Many of them decided to skip school on Fridays, in solidarity with the campaign.

In April 2019, she told the European Parliament, “Our house is falling apart and our leaders need to start acting accordingly, because at the moment they are not.”

A few months later, she went on a two-week trip across the Atlantic Ocean, campaigning for her cause. Time magazine reported that she was given a warm welcome when she arrived in New York. There were high school students with hand-made signs. “The students broke into chants as the sailboat slowly pulled into the marina in Lower Manhattan: ‘Sea levels are rising and so are we!‘There is no Planet B!’”

ALSO READ: God! Don’t Break Our Hearts

“It is insane that a 16-year-old would have to cross the Atlantic Ocean to make a stand,” Greta said in a press conference.

At the UN Climate Action Meet, she said: “I should be back in school on the other side of the ocean. Yet, you all come to us young people for hope. How dare you! You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words.”

“World leaders have held 26 COPs. They have had decades of blah, blah, blah — and where has that got us?” This was again Greta speaking in Glasgow, in a youth protest, in 2021.

Nominated every year for the Noble Peace Prize from 2019 to 2023, clearly, the  young had found an inspirational icon, an indefatigable, dogged and visionary role model.

Then she was 16. Now she is 22. Small, stoic, frail, gutsy, resilient, determined, with a ready smile. Her strength of character is transparent. She smiles easily, even as she risks her life. Her comrades in Madleen, from different countries, also smile easily. They are not afraid. No, not at all.

She stands on the edge of the deck, holding the sail, inhaling the sea wind. Her images, her quotes, her dogged resistance, her clarity of vision, her compassion for the people of Gaza, her anger and angst at the non-stop mass killings, and systematic starvation of the people, bombed and shot dead while standing in queue for food, her disgust at the world leaders, especially in the West, for being complicit in this genocide — Greta has spoken her heart out, and the world has listened — in rapt attention.

Madleen, sailing towards Gaza via the great ancient city of Alexandria, became a floating platform of resistance and hope. A symbol of defiance and justice.

Now, in a pre-recorded message, she has  said that they have been abducted by the notorious Israel Defence Forces (IDF). Reports indicate that before the ‘abduction’ a chemical substance was thrown on the ship which created itchiness in the eyes.

The Israeli foreign ministry has tried sarcasm: “The ‘selfie yacht’ of the ‘celebrities’ is safely making its way to the shores of Israel. The passengers are expected to return to their home countries. They were provided with sandwiches and water. The show is over.”

The show, indeed, is not over. It has just begun.

Rima Hassan, member of the European Parliament, on board Madleen, had a message, and it is all over social media: “If our boat is intercepted and stopped, I don’t want to hear excuses, everyone to the streets! We  will not turn back! We are continuing on our path.”

UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese was on the phone with the crew during their detention. “Madleen must be released immediately,” she said in a post on X. “Breaking the siege is a legal duty for states, and a moral imperative for all of us… Every Mediterranean port should send boats with aid, solidarity, and humanity to Gaza. They shall sail together—united, they will be unstoppable.”

All over the world (barring India, of course) mass protests have erupted, including in Tel Aviv. Hundreds have marched in Tel Aviv, Al Jazeera reported, holding candles, with pictures of the dead children of Gaza.

Stockholm, London, Holland and elsewhere, people are on the streets. In thousands. In Geneva, they have made a huge water fountain with the colours of the Palestinian flag. Inside football stadiums, Palestinian flags are fluttering with chants of ‘Stop the starvation, stop the genocide’.

On campus after campus in the US, students are denouncing the Israeli regime at their graduation ceremonies. Those who are arrested, are refusing to succumb — many more are joining in protest, unafraid of the notorious ICE, the latest Repressive State Apparatus of Donald Trump.

Spain, Columbia, Ireland, Brazil, Chile, South Africa, nation after nation is asking for a total boycott of Israel (not India, surely). As many as 14 nations in the UN Security Council have sought a ceasefire, with a lone America vetoing it. France, Germany, UK — their governments there are under intense pressure.

Dock workers in the West have refused to load deadly weapons bound for Israel. Jews across the world, including Orthodox Jews in Israel, are standing up against the relentless killings. Hollywood actors have signed statements in support (Bollywood etc, well…).

Doctors in the US have protested inside the hospital, despite warnings by the police that they will be arrested. One female doctor shouted, “If you starve children, they just die.” Doctors are risking their lives and reaching Gaza, despite most hospitals having been bombed, especially targeting pregnant women, mothers, and just-born children. 

Greta and her comrades have resurrected infinite optimism. And the will to fight back! Their message has reached the nooks and corners of the world. This grotesque dance of death and enforced starvation must end. Now!

Many more Madleens must now sail for the Mediterranean shores of Gaza. And many more Gretas will now be holding placards, in angst and anger, asking: How Dare You?

Women Wrestlers

Women Wrestlers – Betrayed By Their Own

Great Australian opener Mathew Hayden was on the dot when he said something like this: “I have seen God. He walks in at two down.”

No point in guessing the name of the God, with a Number 10 shirt, like football legend, Diego Maradona. Of course, he was talking about Sachin Tendulkar, whose 50th birth anniversary is being celebrated with full-page spreads and cover stories in the Indian media, and rightfully so. He deserves all the applause for an outstanding and brilliant cricketing career. The only hassle is that ‘His Greatness’ chooses to be so stunningly mum when it comes to burning issues affecting the moral and social fabric of our society, including when it comes to cricket and other sports! Such as wrestling!

In crude contrast, remember his ‘patriotic’ tweet defending the Narendra Modi regime’s obstinate and arrogant disregard of the peaceful and protracted farmers’ struggle against the pro-corporate, pro-Adani farm bills, even while thousands of farmers were braving freezing cold, storms and rain, out in the open, especially when scores of them were dying or dead on the non-violent battlefield at the borders of the Indian capital.

Here is what God tweeted at that time, reacting to an outburst of outrage from the global community, including climate activist Greta Thunberg, on how the Indian government was treating the farmers: “India’s sovereignty cannot be compromised. External forces can be spectators but not participants. Indians know India and should decide for India. Let’s remain united as a nation.”

At that time, the farmers, who loved him as always, were terribly upset and hurt. So were millions of his fans. Surprisingly, hundreds of Keralites flooded tennis star Maria Sharapova’s social media page with apology messages – they had trolled her in 2015 when she had said in an interview that she had no clue about who Sachin Tendulkar is.

Some of them sent an invite welcoming her to ‘God’s Own Country’. “Sharapova, you were right about Sachin, that he is not a person of quality that you should know,” a social media-user said in Malayalam.

So, has the cat got his tongue this time yet again, even while he reads the glowing tributes being paid to his genius on the field, and ignores the saturation coverage on our brave women wrestlers, who have been out in this heat, often, without water, toilets, mattresses, table fans and basic facilities, blocked by the current regime, with such cruel disdain and insensitivity!

Is this how you treat our great sportspersons, especially women world champions? If this is how they treat world champions, then what is the fate of the ordinary, the invisible, the marginal and the obscure, the common citizen, especially women? So whatever happened to the ‘beti bachao and beti padhao’ slogan in this acche din of contemporary India!

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The complainants include a wrestler who was a minor, among others. The accused is a BJP MP, top boss of the Wrestling Federation of India, an alleged history-sheeter, an infamous bahubali from UP, who is refusing to relent, knowing fully well that he is brazenly backed by the top brass of the current BJP establishment in Delhi.

At the centre of the controversy is Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, BJP MP and chief of Wrestling Federation of India

The PM, who never misses a chance to showcase himself with winning sportspersons, has chosen to look the other way, even as he cracks morbid jokes on suicide, and once again plays the ‘victim’ card in Karnataka, where he and his party might face a solid drubbing! Besides, his entire government and party, as usual, seem to care two hoots – including his Union sports minister, infamous for his – Goli maaro… call to the nation, even while our mothers and sisters sat on a peaceful and prolonged protest at Shaheen Bagh in Delhi and elsewhere in the country against the communal and anti-constitutional CAA bill.

These protesters, including a stoic Bajrang Punia, are world champions and Olympic medalists – they are no less in terms of their great and glorious contribution to Indian sports and athletics, often rising from the muddy grassroots of obscurity and hard labour in the arid Hindi hinterland, to reach the pinnacles of competitive success against the best in the world!

And whatever happened to superstar-millionaires like MS Dhoni, and the impeccable idealist of infinite integrity — Rahul Dravid, and badminton stars Saina Nehwal and PS Sindhu, among other greats! If Sania Mirza, a gutsy legend in international women’s tennis with several grand slams as victories, who dared to marry a Pakistani cricketer despite vicious trolls, can speak up so openly, or, if Abhinav Bindra, Kapil Dev, Virender Sehwag, Neeraj Chopra, among others, can stand up for our brilliant women wrestlers, what stops the God at Two Down, or Mr Wall, or Mr Helicopter Shot, to stand up? Or, take their knee in support!

In IPL, 2020, all-rounder Hardik Pandya became the first player in the IPL to take the knee in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement in America, against the murder of George Floyd on the streets by white cops, choking him to death, while he screamed in pain: “Let me breathe!”

And even while Pandya hit a six to reach his half-century, he pointed towards the Mumbai Indians dugout where captain Kieron Pollard (of the West Indies) instantly responded with a raised right fist. That was the spirit!

Even the West Indies’ cricketers took the knee in support of the Black Lives Matter movement in their match against England at the Ageas Bowl in Southampton, southwest England, on July 8, 2020. So what stops the Indian cricketers now, former and current? Will the talented ODI captain from Gujarat take the knee and raise his right fist in support of our women wrestlers – once again?

The Olympians are forced to sleep on the pavement out in the open

It is a dark irony that most Indian celebrities have their lips stitched tight, with their eyes wide-open and wide-shut, ostrich-like, when it comes to burning social and political issues. Unlike in the West. Tennis ace Naomi Osaka openly backed the BLM; during one particular US Open, every round she won was followed by a symbolic gesture to honour the Black people who had been murdered by the cops in the US. Significantly, she won that Grand Slam.

Another tennis great, Serena Williams, posted an Instagram video, and what did it show? A young African-American girl overwhelmed by emotion, in a public gathering: “We are Black people, and we shouldn’t have to feel like this,” she said.

NBA legend Michael Jordan condemned the “ingrained racism” in the US. “I am deeply saddened, truly pained and plain angry,” he said. “I stand with those who are calling out the ingrained racism and violence toward people of colour in our country.”

Among other celebrities, actors Tyler Cameron, Kate Beckingsale, Jennifer Lopez, and a host of others, came out openly in support of the BLM movement. At other times, George Clooney, Susan Sarandon, Robert Redford, Sean Penn, among others, have stood for justice against the system, as did others against the brazenly unjust Vietnam War. In the past, Brazilian captain, philosopher and soccer star, Socrates, would take the field with messages against the army dictatorship then ruling the country — in total defiance. So much so, he chose to go to Italy and play there so that he could study the great Italian thinker, Antonio Gramsci, who was imprisoned for years by the fascists – because they were afraid of his genius and his ideas.

And Number Ten jersey holder of Argentina, Maradona! Did the world not see the face of Che Guevara tattooed on his body, and with such pride?

Unlike most Indian celebrities, the cat did not get their tongue when the nation and the world wanted to hear their voices — steadfast, loud and clear, in support of justice — as is the case now with India, with the nation standing up for the cause of the women wrestlers.

Barring, of course, the fanatic bhakts, and their thick-skinned leaders at the helm in the Sangh Parivar and in the Central government!

The Illegal Procedure of Ravi’s Arrest

‘Disha Will Get Justice When Illegal Case Against Her Is Quashed’

Rajani Santosh, a co-activist of Disha Ravi, rues the fact that instead of highlighting the illegal procedure of Ravi’s arrest, the media was busy vilifying a 22-year-old climate activist

Since August 2019, I have been volunteering for several environmental groups for research and advocacy on local environmental issues like waste management, illegal tree felling, water wastage and most recently the farm unrest. Together, we have been trying to declutter, simplify local environmental-friendly practices and along our journey, we are constantly educating ourselves too.

Disha Ravi has been part of the same group of conscientious citizens in Bengaluru who are trying to make a change. Be it Central farm laws, anti-coal campaigns or local climate issues, Disha has been at the forefront of mobilizing young people for petitioning, demonstrating, forming human chains in an orderly and peaceful way. She is also a vocal advocate for animal rights and a vegan too. Law-abiding citizens of her generation who live simple lives are a rare breed.

Therefore, as a co-activist, the news of her arrest (in the Toolkit Case) came as a huge shock. It was chilling to see her being vilified in the media. The Centre’s manipulations and Karnataka govt’s involvement in her arrest should have been highlighted as an attack on Indian federal structure! But instead of speaking about the manner in which a 22-year-old was picked up by the police of another state, reporters were digging out details about a protest toolkit.

Disha and her band of activists in the Fridays For Future (Bengaluru chapter) have been on ground since late 2018 (when she was in college). Learning the science, economics and politics behind the climate crisis, she saw a role model in Greta Thunberg. She voiced her opinion before the powerful and spoke in a language that motivated youth to speak for themselves in other countries.

They organised walks, plogs, conferences, panel discussions since 2019 on a range of social issues. You can see from the timelines on their social media accounts how these students consulted senior environmentalists like Dr Yellappa Reddy, Dr Harini Nagendra, Leo (ESG) and other experts.

Rajani (inset) feels Disha is a rare example of climate conscious citizen of her generation

I do not think the arrest has dampened the spirit at all. It will only make us work closely with each other. Her arrest has brought one fact in focus: that environmental activists have a stake in farm laws because these laws push for farmland consolidation which will lead to loss of biodiversity-based agri-models of our country.

The bail order for Disha Ravi was a relief. However, what happened was wrong and she will get complete freedom only when the case against her is legally quashed. We are in a climate emergency and very few voices are speaking up. Sadly, environmental cases get attention only when there is loss of many human lives due to unnatural floods, glacial bursts or similar man-made disaster. Soon, the issue gets buried under news TRPs and we move to the next calamity.

For now, Disha is lying low and speaking to very few of us, and I think that is best for her now. But I am in touch with her lawyers and we shall take this case to its logical, legal conclusion.

Not Just Rihanna-Greta, Many Global Figures Back Farmers Protest

Since the news of the Farmer’s Protests in India have started to make the International News, the surge in the support on social media has sky rocketed after celebrities such as  Rihanna, Greta Thunberg and US Vice President, Kamala Harris’s niece have shown their support.

While this has helped the international community become aware and understand better the protests that have been happening in India over the past 5 months there has been some backlash from the Indian authorities.

They issued a statement on Wednesday 3rd February 2021, accusing ‘foreign individuals’ and celebrities of ‘sensationalism’ following Rihanna’s post.

While Rihanna, has helped bring light to the farmer’s protests with her plus 100 million followers and her comment retweeted more than 230,000 times and liked by more than half a million users, she is not the first celebrity to speak out about the New Farm Laws. Take a look below how other celebrities from cricketer Monty Panesar and filmmaker Gurinder Chadha to American actor John Cussack have lend weight to the raging protests.