We are consuming subjects in a surveillance economy, not citizens. @suchitrav. We still argue if something should be a massacre, a pogrom, or a riot. That capacity to be able to go away and then come back profoundly affects how you write because then you are still rooted. Follow our team of columnists and reporters who write about the media. Vijayan: There is an elusive distance between the photographer and the photographed that cant be bridged. Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, GQ, The Boston Review, The Hindu, and Foreign Policy, and she has appeared on NBC news. Second, border policies are about "performance and articulations of citizenship". Midnights Borders , Suchitra Vijayan includes a photo of the pillar, which becomes a cricket stump for boys on either side of the border most days. In Midnight's Borders, Suchitra Vijayan meditates on belongingness, freedom and political implications of territorial demarcations 'The border making project is central to the capitalist and neoliberal logic,' Vijayan says. Indias intellectual, journalistic, and literary landscape is profoundly problematic and alienating. There are enough stories of people parachuting into communities to do human interest stories. What connects these messages is deep empathy and a willingness to engage with the books stories, ideas, and arguments. Vijayan creates a constellation of micro-histories of people who have lived through the violence . I came with my privileges, also lets not forget prejudices. Itembodied young Indias grand ambitions and aspired to a nation made of men and women equally protected by the law. Vijayans book begins a much-needed conversation on thinking about freedom beyond the idea of nation and its illusory lines. The government, of course, denies this. She is actively involved in circulating urgent and underrepresented news from the world through her online platform. What do you think the future holds? Vijayan is no stranger to stories of violence. When your investigations in Kashmir came to an end, what changes did you observe in your 'grammar of dissent'? Siaan On Being Queer And Being Online, FII Interviews: Journalist Meena Kotwal On Minority Politics, Journalism Today And The Caste Divide. Many come from immense privileges of caste, class, wealth, access, and resources. In Nellie (Assam) too, where over 3,000 Muslims were killed in 1983, people stared at Vijayan in confusion, no one comes here anymore, she was told. We see that more clearly when you decide against photographing children at the India-Bangladesh border. Suchitra is a BSc graduate from Mar Ivanios College (Trivandrum). Perhaps there are lessons to learn from that. We have migrated to a new commenting platform. In terms of violence, there is also this tendency to photograph and display the bodies of marginalised communities when they experience violence. None of this helps in telling richer, more textured stories. Suchitra Vijayan complicates and expands our understanding of the South Asian American experience, urging readers to consider stories that cast dark eyes at India, a strategic ally of many Western nations. It took me 8 years to write the book. Also read: The History Of The Colonial State And The Unmaking Of The Tawaif. Yes, men who act as petty sovereigns are everywhere. We need more such books. Q: What struck me about your work was its immersive style. India and its Borderlands: Suchitra Vijayan in Conversation with Sharjeel Usmani, Book talk with Suchitra Vijayan, author of Midnights Borders, Crisis at the Border: Contestation, Sovereignty, and Statelessness. I had to write and rewrite this book so many times. The third thing is: were going back to relitigating everything. Vijayan: I would say I am hopeful. Even as 70% of the border with Bangladesh has been fenced, "smugglers, drug couriers, human traffickers and cattle rustlers continue to cross to ply their. There is no denying that the American media landscape is deeply racist, and while the past few years have seen more brown people take center stage, its nowhere close to where we need to be. Also, we shouldn't forget that the border making project is central to capitalist and neoliberal logic. We know that the purpose of borders has kept changing for nations. Subscribe to the Rumpus Book Clubs (poetry, prose, or both) and Letters in the Mail from authors (for adults and kids). She is the founder and executive director of The Polis Project, and the author of. Now imagine how it would be for someone from a Dalit/Bahujan, Muslim, Adivasi, or working community to try to make inroads. Over the past 15 years, small democratisation through social media has enabled challenging these practices. Rumpus: Why do you think the ever-growing canon of Indian American literature has barely tried to engage with these conversations through their stories? Respond to our political present. To make matters worse, between 2013 and 2019, editors of channels and publications have been sacked and replaced, primarily because of their criticism of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party. This is a tightrope that you walk so well. By Suchitra Vijayan, Why should I read it? Chopra has long been neoliberalisms reluctant feminist, hawking giving a voice and sisterhood while silencing those who question her. Indias intellectual, journalistic, and literary landscape is profoundly problematic and alienating. Suchitra Vijayan was born and raised in Madras, India. ""The historical unity of the ruling classes is realized in the state." Antonio Gramsci" I now think twice about calling friends, worried if this might put them at risk. No one can write a book alone. At worst, its navel gazing peppered with white guilt, but always politically vacuous. The publishing landscape, including Indian publishing, is deeply flawedit is upper class, upper caste, and deeply alienating for anyone who doesnt come from already established and existing networks of privilege. Our investigation into the Indian medias reporting on the Pulwama attack found that many reports were contradictory, biased, incendiary and uncorroborated. Suchitra is now a singer-songwriter as well, composing music on her own and in collaboration with Singer Ranjith. You need to write what you seethats why you started this project.. Abrogation Of Article 370 Jammu And Kashmir Statehood, BSF foils another Pakistan plot, shoots down drone in Punjab's Amritsar, Light on weight, heavy on damage: India will be able to hit deep inside Pakistan with THIS ultralightweight howitzer, Put issues related to border in 'proper place', work for its early normalisation: Chinese FM Qin to Jaishankar, In Midnight's Borders, Suchitra Vijayan meditates on belongingness, freedom and political implications of territorial demarcations. Copyright 2023. The acts of writing, documenting, photographing, and archiving carry privileges of caste and class. Is photographing a woman, who was gang-raped by the Sudanese army and put on the cover of TIMEpractically naked, able to stop the war? Suchitra Vijayan. How do you protect this child? It is also the site of the worlds biggest crisis of statelessness, as it strips citizenship from hundreds of thousands of its peopleespecially those living in disputed border regions. The emotional cost is something else altogether. I am repeating what I have said before, "Kashmir is Indias greatest moral and political failure. The interview has been paraphrased and condensed for clarity, at the interviewers discretion. This means that, for the longest time, the depiction of violence and marginalised communities has been problematic. In 1971, East Pakistan seceded and became Bangladesh. If you want to support the work that goes behind publishing high-quality feminist media content, please consider becoming a FII member. So the question is not: will the future be borderless? How did you arrive at this stylistic juncture where you manage to tell the stories of these people who are radically less privileged than you without appropriating them? A: I lost friends, saw my father go through a transplant, and I gave birth. Vijayan: Let me start heregood writing is powerful and political. Listen to Season 3 on Apple, Spotify and Google podcasts. Chopra cleverly uses womens empowerment, diversity, and the immigrant story as a facade to parrot and promote deeply problematic ideologies, takes, and stances. Ananya is a chaotic humanities student with a deep interest in the relationship between art and society, a writing obsession, and way too many bizarre ideas involving their camera. But also, to be clear in terms of what I wanted to accomplish: as I say in the book, I wasnt bearing witness or giving voice to the voicelessthe people in this book are eloquent and political voices of their lives and realities. I believe it can teach us to ask these questions again. As I say in the book, Kashmir changed me, it gave me political and moral clarity to always stand with those fighting for their peoples freedom and dignity. It took a long time to get the voice right. Rumpus: The book derives its emotional strength and narrative energy from the stories of people you encounter at the borders. Husain Haqqani: Pakistan released the Indian pilot. She never did like my then-husband, which makes her a better judge of character than I was. The taxi driver who describes the Egyptian revolution in five minutes to an American columnist (who speaks no Arabic) is sadly where the genre is today. Vijayan creates a constellation of micro-histories of people who have lived through the violence that India has committed in its borderlandsinjustice that has irrigated the glamour and prosperity we witness in what some of us in those borderlands call mainland India. Vijayan, a barrister by profession, is a founding director of Polis Project, a hybrid research and journalism organization in New York. No one would put themselves through the agony and pain of writing. Sari Begum, born of rape during the Partition and married off to a violent, alcoholic man twenty years older than her, is forced to part with her land to make space for an army bunker, while Natasha Javed stumbles upon a piece of family history that reveals her ancestor being killed in the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre of 1919 and the subsequent trauma and loss of having to be forcefully emptied of history when they crossed over to Pakistan, and how talking about this would make them traitors in their homeland. And were there any apprehensions since you began working on this book? Along the way, we meet the men and women of TASC, dissenting students, ISIS terrorists and Pakistani military officers. She responded to an ad for the post of an RJ in Radio Mirchi. The two press briefings by the foreign secretary and Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson entertained no questions. Despite the failures in investigation and prosecution related to criminal trials arising out of the pogrom, the judiciary has projected itself as an able and willing neutral arbiter of justice that is not complicit with the deep structures of Hindutvas anti-Muslim prejudice https://t.co/EFf5bxYEBt, True societal change has always emerged from the ground-up, with communities fighting for their own freedom and dignity. There are instances when you and some voices in the narrative question their documentation practice. The act of recording and documenting cannot be divorced from the inherent question of power. In another essay from 2019, I write about the banality of bearing witness as an excuse to produce extractive work. These questions about documentation practices started long before I started this book project, and I learnt along the way. The stories were a way to understand how people struggled and survived. Now, along with the medias legitimization of an ideology that promotes violence including riots and lynchings its performance after Pulwama leaves severe doubts as to whether it is engaged in journalism or the propagation of Hindu majoritarianism. Now imagine how it would be for someone from a Dalit/Bahujan, Muslim, Adivasi, or working community to try to make inroads. This is not the violent right wing and their siege; its centrist and liberal media that is also relitigating history, deconstructing the core values of the constitution. Such writings have long been implicated in the history of colonial ethnographic practices, where native informants are poised to become the voices of the empire. And our language helps us imagine a vision that is truly just, beautiful and ethical. She sang her first song for the movie, Lesa Lesa under the composition of Harris Jayaraj and her co-singer was the legendary, K. S. Chitra. I can see small cracks beginning to appear. I spoke with Suchitra by email in July about Midnights Borders, the power of literary nonfiction, new possibilities of Indian American literature, neoliberal politics, and the importance of supporting underrepresented stories. They continue to. We live in a profoundly unequal society, where every day brings news of new devastation. The controversy surrounding the Rafale deal and allegations of corruption against the government were suddenly sidelined, as was the order for the eviction of more than a million forest dwellers (that was later stayed) and a hearing on the repeal of an important constitutional clause before the Supreme Court. I dont have apprehensions. 582.1K views. Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. I think these are fundamental questions of freedom and dignity. Vijayan has travelled 9,000 miles over seven 7 across India's borderline remote areas and has collected many bone-chilling, painful, myth-breaking stories of the people caught in between inter-state disputes because of the lines created by colonial powers who ruled over us for . There is something deeply flawed in the way we live today. The black and white pictures accompanying the chapters add a thousand words more. A place to read, on the Internet. We thank her for her time, patience, and illuminating insights into her work. How do you think this shapes climate justice? Suchitra Vijayan and Francesca Recchia In this era when Indian armed forces and the police act with absolute impunity, a handful of local news outlets play an essential role in reporting and. 42, Moss Rose Heights, M.M Ali road, WASA Circle, Lalkhan Bazar, Chittogong 4000. It has taken me over a decade to get here. In politics we will have equality, and in social and economic life, we will have inequality. What do these events have in common? Rohini Menon for Feminism in India, FII Interviews: Suchitra Vijayan Talks About Marginalisation, Institutional Violence & Political Imagination, Ananya is a chaotic humanities student with a deep interest in the relationship between art and society, a writing obsession, and way too many bizarre ideas involving their camera. [3], She started singing after a few years as RJ. Photograph of Suchitra Vijayan courtesy of Suchitra Vijayan. A: This is a very loaded question. When Vijayan meets him, he is inside his home with all the windows closed and sealed to snuff out light. In this stunning work of narrative reportagefeaturing over 40 original photographswe hear from those whose stories are never told: from children playing a cricket match in no-mans-land, to an elderly man living in complete darkness after sealing off his home from the floodlit border; from a woman who fought to keep a military bunker off of her land, to those living abroad who can no longer find their family history in India. First, does my work aid the powerful? Part-time Faculty suchitra@thepolisproject.com. Growing up I was surrounded by people who emphasised the community over anything else. The writing grew around the images and the visual memory of the encounters. For far too long, they and their progeny have held power to shape the political understanding of our social worlds. Why is this particular time of the day intrinsic to the book? I kept detailed audio notes that I recorded each night when I traveled. Indian Foreign Secretary V.K. And what does this mean for on-ground communities, governments, armed forces, and other institutional stakeholders? With the phone armed with a camera, everyone is a photographer; we are all witnesses. Dear reader, this article is free to read and it will remain free but it isnt free to produce.