Communalism and Sexual Violence in India

Communalism and Sexual Violence in India
Author: Megha Kumar
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 395
Release: 2016-06-16
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 178672068X

Sexual violence has been a regular feature of communal conflict in India since independence in 1947. The Partition riots, which saw the brutal victimization of thousands of Hindu, Muslim and Sikh women, have so far dominated academic discussions of communal violence. This book examines the specific conditions motivating sexual crimes against women based on three of the deadliest riots that occurred in Ahmedabad city, Gujarat, in 1969, 1985 and 2002. Using an in-depth, grassroots-level analysis, Megha Kumar moves away from the predominant academic view that sees Hindu nationalist ideology as responsible for encouraging attacks on women. Instead, gendered communal violence is shown to be governed by the interaction of an elite ideology and the unique economic, social and political dynamics at work in each instance of conflict. Using government reports, Hindu nationalist publications and civil society commentaries, as well as interviews with activists, politicians and riot survivors, the book offers new insights into the factors and ideologies involved in communal violence, as well as the conditions that work to prevent sexual violence in certain riot contexts.The Politics of Sexual Violence in India will be valuable for academic researchers, Human Rights organizations, NGOs working with survivors of sexual violence and for those involved with community development and urban grassroots activism.

Women and Violence in India

Women and Violence in India
Author: Tamsin Bradley
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 268
Release: 2017-02-28
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1786731185

India's endemic gender-based violence has received increased international scrutiny and provoked waves of domestic protest and activism. In recent years, related studies on India and South Asia have proliferated but their analyses often fail to identify why violence flourishes. Unwilling to simply accept patriarchy as the answer, Tamsin Bradley presents new research examining how different groups in India conceptualise violence against women, revealing beliefs around religion, caste and gender that render aggression socially acceptable. She also analyses the role that neoliberalism, and its corollary consumerism, play in reducing women to commodity objects for barter or exchange. Unpacking varied conservative, liberal and neoliberal ideologies active in India today, Bradley argues that they can converge unexpectedly to normalise violence against women. Due to these complex and overlapping factors, rates of violence against women in India have actually increased despite decades of feminist campaigning. This book will be crucial to those studying Indian gender politics and violence, but also presents new data and methodologies which have practical implications for researchers and policymakers worldwide.

Gender and Violence in Historical and Contemporary Perspectives

Gender and Violence in Historical and Contemporary Perspectives
Author: Jyoti Atwal
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 253
Release: 2019-08-08
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1000639231

This book covers a range of issues and phenomena around gender-related violence in specific cultural and regional conditions. Using an interdisciplinary approach, it discusses historical and contemporary developments that trigger violence while highlighting the social conditions, practices, discourses, and cultural experiences of gender-related violence in India. Beginning with the issues of gender-based violence within the traditional context of Indian history and colonial encounters, it moves on to explore the connections between gender, minorities, marginalisation, sexuality, and violence, especially violence against Dalit women, disabled women, and transgender people. It traces and interprets similarities and differences as well as identifies social causes of potential conflicts. Further, it investigates the forms and mechanisms of political, economic, and institutional violence in the legitimation or de-legitimation of traditional gender roles. The chapters deal with sexual violence, violence within marriage and family, influence of patriarchal forces within factory-based gender violence, and global processes such as demand-driven surrogacy and the politics of literary and cinematic representations of gender-based violence. The book situates relevant debates about India and underlines the global context in the making of the gender bias that leads to violence both in the public and private domains. An important contribution to feminist scholarship, this book will be useful to scholars and researchers of gender studies, women’s studies, history, sociology, and political science.

The Cunning of Gender Violence

The Cunning of Gender Violence
Author: Lila Abu-Lughod
Publisher: Duke University Press
Total Pages: 302
Release: 2023-06-30
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1478024542

The Cunning of Gender Violence focuses on how a once visionary feminist project has folded itself into contemporary world affairs. Combating violence against women and gender-based violence constitutes a highly visible and powerful agenda enshrined in international governance and law and embedded in state violence and global securitization. Case studies on Palestine, Bangladesh, Iran, India, Pakistan, Israel, and Turkey as well as on UN and US policies trace the silences and omissions, along with the experiences of those subjected to violence, to question the rhetoric that claims the agenda as a “feminist success story.” Because religion and racialized ethnicity, particularly “the Muslim question,” run so deeply through the institutional structures of the agenda, the contributions explore ways it may be affirming or enabling rationales and systems of power, including civilizational hierarchies, that harm the very people it seeks to protect. Contributors. Lila Abu-Lughod, Nina Berman, Inderpal Grewal, Rema Hammami, Janet R. Jakobsen, Shenila Khoja-Moolji, Vasuki Nesiah, Samira Shackle, Sima Shakhsari, Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian, Dina M Siddiqi, Shahla Talebi, Leti Volpp, Rafia Zakaria

Gujarat Under Modi

Gujarat Under Modi
Author: CHRISTOPHE. JAFFRELOT
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 564
Release: 2024-07
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0197787509

The definitive account of Modi's rule over his home state of Gujarat, for better and worse--a template he now applies to India as a whole.

The Troubling State of India's Democracy

The Troubling State of India's Democracy
Author: Dinsha Mistree
Publisher: University of Michigan Press
Total Pages: 394
Release: 2024-08-06
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0472904655

As India’s power and prominence rise on the international stage, its longstanding tradition of democracy is under threat. Since establishing a secular and democratic constitution in 1950, India has held elections at the local, state, and national levels with frequent transitions of power between opposing parties. This commitment to democracy has provided political order to a country that is twice the size of Europe and with a stunning array of social and economic divides. Despite this rich tradition, India’s democracy faces an unprecedented threat with the rise of Narendra Modi and his Hindu nationalist party, the Bharatiya Janata Party. After decisively winning general elections in 2014, Modi and the BJP have pursued a range of anti-democratic policies in which the state and society are used to undermine the opposition, to stifle free speech, and to harass religious minorities. The Troubling State of India’s Democracy brings together leading scholars from around the world to assess the conditions of India’s democracy across three important dimensions: politics, specifically the state of political parties and the party system; the state, including the condition of federalism and the health of various institutions; and society, including NGOs, ethnic and religious tensions, and control of the media. Even though elements of India’s democracy seem to function—like its commitment to elections—the contributors document a disturbing trajectory, one that not only threatens to undermine India’s own stability, but could also affect the global order.

Saffron Republic

Saffron Republic
Author: Thomas Blom Hansen
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 331
Release: 2022-09-30
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1009100483

Approaches contemporary Hindutva as an example of a democratic authoritarianism or an authoritarian populism.

Hurt Sentiments

Hurt Sentiments
Author: Neeti Nair
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 353
Release: 2023-03-07
Genre: History
ISBN: 0674238273

Neeti Nair explores the trend toward legal protection for the religious “sentiments” of majorities in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. Nair offers historical context for contemporary persecution and rising religious fundamentalism, and highlights how growing political solicitation of religious sentiments has fueled a secular resistance.

Violent Belongings

Violent Belongings
Author: Kavita Daiya
Publisher: Temple University Press
Total Pages: 274
Release: 2011-02-04
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 159213744X

Violent Belongings examines transnational South Asian culture from 1947 onwards in order to offer a new, historical account of how gender and ethnicity came to determine who belonged, and how, in the postcolonial Indian nation.