a situation where a great many things are destroyed and a great many people die......

Remembering the Holocaust

Marked by the United Nations each year on the 27th of January, International Holocaust Remembrance Day provides an opportunity to recount the atrocities of the Holocaust that resulted in the death of an estimated 6 million Jews. The day marks the anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi German concentration and extermination camp Auschwitz-Birkenau in January 1945. The aphorism for Holocaust remembrance remains unchanged: Never Again. A turning point in history, the Holocaust is one of the most visible acts of violence and discrimination. Yet, lessons of the past seem to fade in the mists of time. Are those who do not remember the past condemned to repeat it?

Holocaust distortion and denial

As the Holocaust recedes in time, the forces of antisemitism, racial and religious intolerance, and discrimination and hate speech pose new challenges to global civilisational values, thereby running the risk of repetition of the crimes of the past. Holocaust ignorance, distortion and denial are growing at an alarming rate. The Anti-Defamation League Global 100, an index on antisemitism, found that antisemitic sentiments are disturbingly pervasive, with more than a quarter of the people surveyed, an estimated 1.09 billion people, harbouring antisemitic attitudes around the world. Across Asia, only 23% of persons surveyed had heard of the Holocaust and believe the historical account. Data from North America and Europe show that younger people are less likely to be aware of the historical accounts of the Holocaust, with less than half of those surveyed under the age of 35 having ever heard of the Holocaust. Considering India’s youthful demography, these statistics are important. The youth proved to be particularly vulnerable to the techniques employed by extremists to spread hateful and racist ideologies, which underscores the importance of empowering the youth with the knowledge, capacities, and agency to reject hate.

Engaging the youth with the painful history of the Holocaust and the ethical and moral issues it highlights has contemporary relevance as a tool to help fight hatred and prompt discussion of the societal contexts that enable exclusionary policies to divide communities. With an ever more globalised young generation, capitalising on the power of education, communication and connectivity is important as they are effective tools to galvanise people into action.

India’s growing global influence and efforts towards digitisation provide further impetus to expand youth networks so that young people across the world can connect, share experiences, and negate extremist mindsets, ultimately strengthening efforts to disavow violence and discrimination. However, this needs to be carefully monitored as the lack of critical skills to filter out or navigate misinformation or disinformation on social media can leave the youth vulnerable to hate speech online. According to a publication by the Center for Countering Digital Hatred, antisemitism can be found on all social media platforms. The situation is worse in languages other than English, as social media companies including Facebook and YouTube lack global content moderation teams. This is important to note especially in the Indian context, as the youth make up a greater portion of the Internet user base.

Malicious words have the power to spark a wildfire, for it is words that started the Holocaust. Therefore, to prevent Indian youth from disseminating various forms of hate speech, both online and offline, we must educate them about the Holocaust and antisemitism today to deepen reflection about contemporary issues that affect societies around the world, such as the power of extremist ideologies, propaganda, the abuse of official power, and group-targeted hate and violence.

Addressing antisemitism

India’s vision to create inclusive and equitable education that includes more detailed knowledge of various cultures, religions, languages, and gender identities to develop respect for diversity through the National Educational Policy 2020 already creates a fertile ground for working on Holocaust education programmes. To further this vision and strengthen the resilience of Indian society against antisemitic discourses, the Embassies of Israel and Germany, with the support of UNESCO, are organising a workshop on antisemitism for policymakers, school principals and educators this February. Using existing training resources, experts from UNESCO, Israel and Germany will equip educators with the knowledge and approaches needed to use the history of the Holocaust to make ‘Never Again’ an actionable promise emanating from our classrooms.

With the community of Holocaust survivors dwindling, we need the youth to take forward the lessons of the past. It is imperative that they are empowered with knowledge to combat myths and falsehoods, and to be able to withstand influence from violent extremism and hate speech

Comments

WHAT IS THE MAIN APPEAL .........Need to move with caution

COGNITIVE SKILLS OF ELEPHANT Elephants have been observed using such ‘learned’ skills to either cleverly cross electric fences using their non-conducting tusks or if no tusks, destroying the entire fence by hurling uprooted trees on the wire or pushing down the cemented poles to disconnect the wire. These are some testimonies suggesting how elephants perhaps may be learning to solve the conundrum based on their previous noxious experiences. . WHY WE ARE FORGOTTEN ABOUT SOMETHING People visiting forests feel great about being in nature. They capture some memories and photographs, and write blogs about how splendid nature is. What they forget in the due course is the compromise some of the long-ranging animals must have gone through. One such animal that needs a large roaming space and seasonal connectivity to different forests are elephants. Their movements are not just motivated for foraging, but for searching for mates, suitable habitats across seasons and resources. MAN AN...

A GLIMPSE OF ONE OF THE FIRST LOVE.......

True spirit amongst aspirants TUMHE DEKHA TO LAGA KI... ABHI ABHI MERA JANM HUA HAI, TERE AANE KI AAHAT, MERE DIL KI YE GHABRAHAT..., ROSHANI KA TUMHARE SATH AKAAR, KYA YE HAI MERE MAN KI PUKAR..., TU MUSKURAI MAI STABDH RAH GAYA, HAN MAIN BHI MUSKURAYA...... AUR MUJHE PYAR HO GAYA.... MAIN YE SONCHATA HE RAH GAYA... ISWAR AAJ SURYODAY KE ANTIM PAHAL ME, RASTA KYUN BHOOL GAYA..... IN ENGLISH WHEN I SAW YOU I FELT THAT I WAS BORN JUST NOW, THE FEAR OF YOUR ARRIVAL, THE FEAR OF MY HEART, THE LIGHT WITH YOU, IS THIS THE CALL OF MY HEART...., YOU REMAINED STILL IN SMILE, YES I ALSO SMILED IN LOVE I HAVE BEEN THINKING THAT WHY DID GOD FORGET THIS WAY IN THE LAST MOMENT OF SUN.....

HATE SPEECH IS NOT A LITTLE BIT SPARKLE......IS N'T IT ?

WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY A HATE SPEECH There is no specific legal definition of ‘hate speech’. Provisions in law criminalise speeches, writings, actions, signs and representations that foment violence and spread disharmony between communities and groups and these are understood to refer to ‘hate speech’. The Law Commission of India, in its 267th Report, says: “Hate speech generally is an incitement to hatred primarily against a group of persons defined in terms of race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief and the like ... Thus, hate speech is any word written or spoken, signs, visible representations within the hearing or sight of a person with the intention to cause fear or alarm, or incitement to violence.” In general, hate speech is considered a limitation on free speech that seeks to prevent or bar speech that exposes a person or a group or section of society to hate, violence, ridicule or indignity. CONTEXT A recent religious conclave held in Haridwar...

GLOBAL HEALTH PROFILE VULNERABILITY.......

THE ONGOING GLOBAL HEALTH EMERGENCY HAS PARALYSED ECONOMIES WORLDWIDE AND REVEALED THAT THE HEALTH SYSTEMS IN MOST COUNTRIES ARE UNDER-PREPARED TO COPE WITH ANY MAJOR HEALTH EMERGENCY. It has posed large-scale health challenges as millions of people (172,430,557 as on 3 June 2021) have been infected and lakhs of casualties (3,706,682 as on 3 June 2021) have occurred. The importance of public health does not need elucidation as the pandemic has revealed that inadequate attention to public health can have disastrous consequences on the masses. High-income countries such as Canada, Sweden and Germany, despite their exceptional public health systems, have had to struggle to contain the pandemic by experimenting with a number of uncertain alternatives. Understandably, the struggle for middle and low-income countries, having weak public healthcare systems, limited finances and large populations has been grim. India too, has been grappling with the pandemic and the ...

ACTUAL FEELING OF SOLVING REAL.......

to prepare you to face Aasma hai behad khoobsoorat, Rangaeen roshni aa rahi hai falak pe..... Sampoorn dharatal hai bheega, Jeevan ke pahar mein Ambar bhi mahak raha, Vasudha ke upvan mein Chintan mein hai dhara, Aas lagaye sunya se, Milogi mujhe ya rah jaogi chitiz mein...... IN ENGLISH The sky is very beautiful, Colorful light coming on the sky.... It's complete strike, It will be wet in the mountain of life, The sky is also fragrant(garden) in the wake of vasudha (earth), The river is in the thoughts. Hope you will meet sunya(sky) or you will remain in the chitiz(at the location where sky and earth will meet)............ SKY MEANS SOMEONE ELSE EARTH MEANS MYSELF.

VAGUENESS IN FEDERALISM......

Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel and Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot on Friday wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi opposing the proposed amendments to the Indian Administrative Service (Cadre) Rules 1954. The proposed amendments will give overriding powers to the Union government to post All India Services (AIS) officers such as the IAS, the Indian Police Service and the Indian Forest Service (IFoS) to Central Ministries and departments without the State government’s nod. Mr. Baghel and Mr. Gehlot are second in line after West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee to convey their opposition against the proposed amendments to Mr. Modi. Sense of ‘instability’ Mr. Baghel said the amendments could be misused and “a sense of instability and ambiguity is likely to arise among the officers of the All India Services, who are posted at various important posts in various districts and also at the State level.” He said the proposed amendment granted the Centra...

TOURISM IS THE NEED OF HOUR WHY ?

BIG QUESTION There is an awareness in the government that the absence of tourist infrastructure is a major reason why India loses out to Southeast Asia. India has a vast basket of living and diverse cultural traditions, Traditional expressions, intangible cultural heritage comprising masterpieces which need institutional support and encouragement with a view to addressing areas critical for the survival and propagation of these forms of cultural heritage. Preserving our heritage is enshrined as a Fundamental Duty in our Constitution . STEPS HAVE BEEN TAKEN Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently inaugurated the Kushinagar international airport. ● The airport in eastern UP, the third international airport in the election-bound state, will mainly service the Buddhist tourism circuit. ● The Sri Lankan Airlines flight carrying monks and dignitaries was the first to land at the airport. st Asian nations such as Indon...

first ever scientific bird atlas......

The Kerala Bird Atlas (KBA), the first-of-its-kind State-level bird atlas in India, has created solid baseline data about the distribution and abundance of bird species across all major habitats, giving an impetus to futuristic studies. Conducted as a citizen science-driven exercise with the participation of over 1,000 volunteers of the birdwatching community, the KBA has been prepared based on systematic surveys held twice over 60 days a year during the wet (July to September) and dry (January to March) seasons between 2015 and 2020. The KBA accounts for nearly three lakh records of 361 species, including 94 very rare species, 103 rare species, 110 common species, 44 very common species, and 10 most abundant species. “The KBA offers authentic, consistent and comparable data through random sampling from the geographical terrain split into nearly 4,000 grids. We are in the process of bringing out papers on interesting trends based on a scientific analysis of solid dat...

The Budget spells green shoots for agri-subsectors

At the time it was presented, and in the context of the Assembly elections in five States — now underway in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Manipur and Goa https://sites.google.com/view/insightsdev/home the Union Budget was expected to contain measures to boost consumption expenditure. But the Government chose instead to focus more on capital expenditure. There were no major announcements on agriculture or rural development. Given the recent turmoil as a result of the farmers’ protests and the repeal of the farm laws, this was a little surprising. However, a closer look at the Budget presents a different picture. Allotments, key subsectors It is important to look at the budgetary allocations for agriculture from the perspective of agricultural growth and farmers’ income. Agriculture has registered a robust performance during the COVID-19 pandemic and has clocked decent growth rates of 4.3% and 3.6% during 2019-20 and 2020-21. Growth is projected to be about 3.9% i...

MONEY LAUNDERING........The despotic nature of the PMLA

The draconian PMLA of 2002 has evolved as the Government’s “hatchet” law in recent years, considering the series of raids and arrests of politicians, their relatives, and activists, most of them who are critical of the ruling regime. The unease about the law has become so rife that a bunch of petitions filed by people across the country have questioned the almost blanket powers given to the ED through this law. The Act was enacted in a 2002 response to India’s global commitment (including the Vienna Convention) to combat the menace of money laundering, stemming from the trade of drugs and narcotics and the organised crime that goes with it. Lawyers argue that the PMLA is invoked against a political rival or a dissenter, because the “process is itself the punishment”. They point out that the ECIR, an equivalent of the FIR, is considered an “internal document” and not given to the accused. Which means that, pursuant to the registration of the ECIR, as the ED begins to...

PESTEL

Search This Blog