We use the term 'host' or receiver to denote the country where the diaspora have  settled. Diaspora-related issues can arise from three broadly based categories:

a) Life in the receiving country
    Formerly the colonised, now we are minorities in the metropolitan centres.

  - How did we get here? How have we been received?

  - What have we achieved so far - in education, Arts, business,...?

  - What sort of society is this? What are its values? Is it multicultural?

    How tolerant, just or equal?

  - How are we relating to the host society, state institutions & local communities?
 

b) Relating to the homeland.

  - through professional contacts, community projects, cultural exchanges, responses to political & economic developments of concern to the diaspora.

c) Relations between (i) host & homeland, (ii) West & Third World

    This category throws up a huge range of issues: colonial history, imperialism, religion, media etc.

Here are broad areas to be explored:

• Community - our origins, demography, our Arts, etc
• Discourse - colonial history, western  worldview, concepts & thought categories
• Religion - history & state of Christianity, what religious leaders say, morality, ...

• Media - relations with state, business & people, propaganda, representation of  minorities,...

• State - foreign policy, the new imperialism, immigration, social justice issues
• Economic issues - neo-liberalism, globalisation, EU issues, ...
• Society - youth culture, decadence, racism, ...

      Coverage is in the form of short commentaries & critiques, essays & reviews.

Noam Chomsky, political analyst and social critic (1969):
“It is the responsibility of intellectuals to seek the truth lying behind the veil of distortion and misrepresentation, ideology and class interest…”

Salman Rushdie, novelist, about TV misrepresentations  (1984):
“It always matters to label rubbish as rubbish; to ignore it is to legitimise it… passivity always serves the interests of the status quo…”

A Sivanandan, Director of the Institute of Race Relations, London (1992):
“We live in a disinformation society…and those of us who have had the privilege of an education must use it for the good of the community… telling the people like it is”.

Edward Said (1935-2003) renowned scholar & literary critic
"Resistance is an alternative way of conceiving human history... Writing back to the metropolitan centres, replacing the European narratives of the Orient and Africa is a major way of breaking down the barriers between cultures."

Introduction
1) Arundhati Roy (1999)
”On the world arena, India is paid scant attention and remains one of the most misunderstood and uncelebrated countries on earth.."…
 

2) Professor Bhikku Parekh (Sep06)
“ India counts for little in the world while China in contrast is making huge strides on all fronts.”

3) Rohini Hensman, Countercurrents.org (20Nov07)
”India will continue to be what it has always been, a big little country bobbing along like cork in water - all buoyancy and drift, but no substance (and direction)”.

Democracy
The franchise is universal and large numbers vote. But voters are often duped (literally with wads of cash) by corrupt party officials or candidates or . Historian Guha writes:

“Most politicians are corrupt, and many come from a criminal background. “

Parliament
Parliament & other institutions are foreign imports, alien entities that have not been adapted to Indian conditions. Indian MPs are not disciplined enough for rational argument and debate. They display the bazaar mentality (interrupting, shouting down, not listening). 

By and large, Indian senior politicians are tired old men, intellectual lightweights, with poor communication skills and little diplomatic flair.
They lack charisma, spark, style, vitality; their facial expression tends to be glacial, wooden or vacuous, their manner deadpan; their accent, diction or pitch flawed; delivery laboured & humourless.

 Before western leaders, they get deferential and are unable
- to assert themselves and act as equals ;
- to censure the West for historical injustices, military interventions, use of torture, etc
- to engage in intelligent exchanges or propose new initiatives
  Instead they resort to fawning or flattery.  

With nothing new or intelligent to say, no concrete proposals or prescriptions to offer. they descend into banal utterances, clichés & platitudes.

Foreign Relations
India has failed to make a mark and earn respect in international affairs. Its bungles and miscalculations can be put to intellectual immaturity, poor communication skills & lack of practical experience.
Read more.

Modernity, Intellect & Order

Naipaul visited India in the 1960s and wrote his impressions such as:

People had grown barbarous, indifferent and self-wounding... Here was a nation ceaselessly exchanging banalities with itself; regeneration is believed to come not from being receptive to thought but through magic. In a time of famine, hundreds of gallons of milk were poured over a deity while an Air Force helicopter dropped flowers.

India is a country held together by no intellectual current; it is profoundly dependent on others, both for questions and answers. Every discipline, skill and proclaimed ideal of the modern Indian state is a copy of something known to exist elsewhere. Indians, including the holy men, have continually to look outside for approval. Local judgment has no value. Without the foreign chit, Indians can have no confirmation of their own reality.

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