University Of California, San Diego Drops Author Saiba Verma From Curriculum

The Critical Gender Studies program at UCSanDiego has disaffiliated itself from the author of The Occupied Clinic: Militarism and Care in Kashmir, Dr Saiba Varma. The critical book by Varma was published by Duke University in the US and Yoda Press in India.

In a statement the UCSD바카라�s Critical Gender Studies Program says, responding to the calls by Kashmiri scholars and activists to repudiate Dr. Varma바카라�s research as part of a broader struggle 바카라�against an intensifying Indian settler-colonial rule in Kashmir since 2019, a crackdown against social media communications, and a pattern of arrests of prominent activists in recent months,바카라� CGS has disaffiliated from Dr Varma, meaning that her courses will no longer count toward our major or minor.

바카라�This may be a small act in the scheme of things, but we believe it is a necessary one as we work through our complicities and think seriously about who we must prioritize in our claims of accountability,바카라� the statement reads.

Dr Saiba Varma, Associate Professor in the Anthropology Department and a former CGS Executive Committee member and Faculty Affiliate, came under severe criticism in September last year after her book The Occupied Clinic: Militarism and Care in Kashmir came to fore.

In the introduction of the book the author says, 바카라�Borrowing and extending techniques from British colonial rule, the Indian state enacted the world바카라�s most established, sophisticated, and pervasive systems of emergency rule and legislation and repeatedly criminalized pro-independence demands as 바카라�conspiracies바카라� and 바카라�anti-national.바카라� The Indian state바카라�s global image as 바카라�the world바카라�s largest democracy,바카라� a generous aid donor, and non-interventionist actor have helped disguise its military excesses in Kashmir and other border regions.바카라�

바카라�As an upper-caste and upper-class Indian citizen and subject, I have actively and passively internalized anti-Muslim racism my entire life. I am complicit in the colonization of Kashmir and other regions forcibly incorporated into the Indian nation-state.바카라�

바카라�As Stuart Hall once powerfully stated, there is no such thing as an innocent discourse. To add: there is no such thing as an innocent Indian. In other words, there is no innocent way for any other scholar of Indian origin, including myself, to engage with Kashmir (or any of the other colonialisms underway in the subcontinent) without acknowledging our own embeddedness in histories of violence and harm.바카라�

She, however, was accused of hiding her familial ties while doing research in Kashmir. The author바카라�s father being an officer with Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW), who was posted in the Valley in the 90s created a Twitter storm around the book.

In a statement titled 바카라�CGS Executive Committee's Statement Regarding Former CGS Faculty Affiliate, Dr. Saiba Varma바카라� the UCSD바카라�s Critical Gender Studies Program says, 바카라�...it understands the study of gender to be inextricably bound up with the interlocking systems of race, class, sexuality and nationalism.바카라� 바카라�New faculty on the current Executive Committee bring commitments that are focused explicitly on ethically, intellectually, politically, and spiritually supporting the freedoms of all people.바카라�

바카라�We also believe that Varma바카라�s unrelentingly violent decision to work in this place, where the colonial Indian state ntelligence apparatus had appointed her father (formerly a high-ranking official of the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), the highest intelligence agency of India and architect of torture, counter-insurgency, and counter-terrorism policies in Kashmir and elsewhere) and his colleagues to draw up plans that included torture, sexual violence, and counter-insurgency as instruments of war and everyday occupation was dishonest and deliberately misleading,바카라� the statement says.

바카라�Furthermore, Varma worked without disclosing these familial ties to the patients in whose sessions she sat, or to the psychiatrists and other Kashmiris she is accountable to as an Indian anthropologist working on Kashmir, teaching courses on decolonial methodology, and claiming to harbor a commitment to decolonial, anti-racist, and feminist of color politics,바카라� it adds.

In her defence the author Saiba Varma had said, 바카라�An anonymous account is attacking my research based on my father's former position in the Indian state. My father did work for the security state. He was in Kashmir when I was 10 years old. My work disavows *all* counterinsurgency, past and present, in Kashmir.바카라�

바카라�My father had no direct bearing on the research I바카라�ve done. Recognizing the need to acknowledge this relationship, however, during my fieldwork I disclosed it to Kashmiri scholars and journalists I was close to. My ethical practices and scholarly arguments are accountable to them,바카라� she had tweeted.

바카라�In my book, I write: "As Stuart Hall once stated, there is no innocent discourse...There is no innocent way for any scholar of Indian origin, including myself, to engage with Kashmir."