> > I stayed for a year in Mumbai, and so did a lot of batchmates from MBA and > we never had a problem find a place to stay even though I was a meat eater > (even beef, though we never cooked), smoker, and regularly had people over > drinking alcohol late into the night though we had to watch noise levels. >
With a name like Kiran Karthikeyan, you are less likely to be asked whether you are meat eating or not. When I would phone prospective landlords for renting apartments in Jayanagar, I'd say I was "Mrs. Chandrakiran" instead of taking my name and being slammed on the phone for being a meat eater (which I am largely not). > I think it is a fact of life that if the sub-community you are a part of is > causing trouble, you will face social repression. That is an extremely convenient way of putting things. Just because a government and a media machinery say that attacks are caused by Muslims makes me a prospective trouble maker too. There is no effort made to investigate why after every attack, it is immediately said that some --- toiba or --- jamaati group has admitted to the attacks. Could these not be framing tactics? And it is interesting to note that an educated person like yourself would not take the trouble to interact and move beyond the stereotypes. You would just say, "ah, if the sub-community you are a part of is causing trouble, you will face social repression." Now that definitely makes me want to keep you out of my property. And as a member of that > community, you cannot just shy away from the responsibility of reforming > your sub-community. That stands just as much true for you too. "Your" community has been wreaking as much trouble as "my" community has been. The question is, are hindus really your community as much as Muslims are my community? Is there a universal Hindu or a universal Muslim? > Its either that or you change your name and forgo that > particular identity. You get even better with every sentence. > Even I would be wary of lending my house out to Muslims (or any other > communty which is identified as causing terrorism or generally disturbing > the peace), unless I knew them or they were referred to me from somebody I > know well. Face it, apart from the LTTE, IRA, all other major terrorist > groups I know are Islamic in origin to my knowledge (fringe groups like > Maoists, ULFA etc. being ignored). And I would also be vary of those in > khaki shorts and carry around a long wooden stick. This is the fundamental problem with today's times. And then we ask why is there violence in society? I have never felt like a Muslim in my life before as much as I am made to feel now. My father's factory was burnt down in the riots of 1993 in Bombay by a mob of rowdies, and even then, we never felt discriminated. But in today's times, it seems that the base identity has become so critical in understanding and experiencing the world, that I even feel frightened to be part of this set-up. Yet, live I must! -- Zainab Bawa Ph.D. Student and Independent Researcher Between Places ... http://zainab.freecrow.org