Sounds of silence in South Asia

Today marks the start of an international campaign to stop violence against women.

Try this aerial view for just as long as it takes you to read this piece. What you do next is entirely up to you. Imagine that you’re sitting on an air-chair — minus the A320 — and hovering directly above South Asia. You have an unfettered view of all the countries spread out below you. And you also have a special, satellite-linked electronic gadget that enables you to observe micro- or macro-events in free-time mode: past, present and future.

In the first viewing through your gadget, you watch some of the gore over the years: post-9/11 in Afghanistan; terror and violence that shames all those who witnessed it, in Sri Lanka, J&K, the Northeast, and UP more recently; strife in Nepal and Bangladesh; the state of emergency in Pakistan.

Watching this triggers insight. You see, for instance, that the rape and blood perpetrated in Gujarat 2002 has wounded the South Asian psyche so deeply that it will take many, many years to heal. And it’s not as if the scars of conflict in Punjab, Sri Lanka, or even those of Partition, have disappeared. And always, in every place that violence occurs, women and children are the worst-off.

The second viewing takes you to a decidedly different ribbon of reality. You see the bright colours of care that have traditionally linked everyday life in South Asia — from the ease of non-verbal communication to the diversity of thought, from the biodiversity to the food, from the music and dress to the home-spun philosophy of tolerant, religious beliefs. More than anything else, the urge of ordinary people to live at the pace of peace. Which, you might ask, is real? The trading of violence, or the organic link between people that has flowed through history — long periods of time before globalisation brought in the free-trade zones?

Now, your gadget pans time-forward, to the evening of November 30, and a micro-event in Delhi. People brought together by 16 groups, dressed in yellow or orange gather in Central Park for a silent, candle-lit presence. The colours of choice are saying that these have been misappropriated by blood-stained fundamentalists everywhere. But here they are being used for an appeal for peace and justice in South Asia. Predictably, the gathering is women-led, because in South Asia as indeed everywhere else, it’s women who have demanded peace.

Similar gatherings are unfolding in other cities: Ahmedabad, Baroda, Colombo, Dhaka, Islamabad, Jammu, Kathmandu and Kolkata. November 30 also marks the beginning of a 16-day international campaign to stop violence against women and girls. Says Kamla Bhasin, who has worked for women’s rights, justice and peace in South Asia for about 30 years, “It is because our history is connected that our future too is connected.” She adds, “just peace” is the only way ahead.

This brings up another insight. From your perch in the sky, the synchronised unfolding of the candle-lit events in nine cities may not add up to much beyond being visible as determined dots of intent. But then how can we, least of all those in South Asia, forget that peace flows through the presence of silence?