“At times there's something so precise and mathematically chilling about nationalism. Build a dam to take away water AWAY from 40 million people. Build a dam to pretend to BRING water to 40 million people. Who are these gods that govern us? Is there no limit to their powers?” InspirationalRealityGovernmentTruthWomenCapitalismEconomicsIndiaHuman RightsEqualityCorporationsNationalismExploitationGovernment CorruptionFalse GodsEnvironmental DegradationArundhati RoyDamNarmada Valley Book:The cost of living Source: The cost of living
“I feel ashamed that the new, nuclear, neo-liberal India thinks of itself as a 'natural ally' of Israel. Ever since India began to call itself an emerging superpower, it has become a slavish, groveling satellite state of the US.” ThinkingFeelsStatesNaturalIndiaIsraelNuclearAshamedAlliesEmergingSuperpowerSatellitesGroveling Author:Arundhati Roy
“In a country like India, the British were only able to rule the country because it had completely co-opted the elite of the country, who did their work for them.” CountryAbleIndiaBritishElites Author:Arundhati Roy
“As a woman who grew up in a village in India, I've spent my whole life fighting tradition. There's no way that I want to be a traditional Indian housewife.” WayWantWholeFightingGrewGrew UpTraditionIndiaWhole LifeTraditionalIndianVillageHousewife Author:Arundhati Roy
“India lives in several centuries at the same time. Every night outside my house I pass a road gang of emaciated laborers digging a trench to lay fiber optic cables to speed up digital revolution. They work by the light of a few candles.” LightNightHouseCenturyRevolutionIndiaLaysSpeedDigitalCandleEvery NightGangCablesDiggingFiberTrenchesLaborersDigital Revolution Author:Arundhati Roy
“Dams are the temples of secular India and almost worshipped. They are huge, wet cement flags that wave in our minds. They're the symbol of nationalism to many.” MindHugeIndiaWaveSymbolsTemplesNationalismFlagsWetSecularCementDams Author:Arundhati Roy
“Imagine what would happen if the government were to take the wealth of 200,000 of India's richest people and redistribute it amongst 2 million of India's poorest? We would hear a lot about socialist appropriation and the death of democracy. Why should taking from the rich be called appropriation and taking from the poor be called development?” PeopleIfsShouldGovernmentHappensWealthPoorMillionsDemocracyRichImagineDevelopmentIndiaSocialistPoorestAppropriation Author:Arundhati Roy
“I actually did a quick survey of how caste plays out in contemporary India. The idea that democracy and development have in some ways eroded caste turned out not to be the case, that it has in fact been entrenched and modernised.” WayIdeasPlayFactsCasesDemocracyDevelopmentIndiaContemporarySurveysCastes Author:Arundhati Roy
“In India, whichever language you write in, the possibility of people not understanding irony or not understanding [remains there]. This as a writer is most terrifying!” PeopleWritingLanguageUnderstandingPossibilityIndiaRemainsIrony Author:Arundhati Roy
“I sometimes think I was perhaps the only girl in India whose mother said, "Whatever you do, don't get married". For me, when I see a bride, it gives me a rash. I find them ghoulish, almost.” ThinkingGivingSaidSometimesMotherGirlMarriedIndiaGive MeBrides Author:Arundhati Roy
“The Indian government has managed to turn the concept of nonviolence on its head. Nonviolent resistance and nonviolent governance. Unlike, say, China or Turkey or Indonesia, India doesn't mow down its people. It doesn't kill people who are refusing to move. It just waits it out. It continues to do what it has to do and ignores the consequences.” PeopleGovernmentMovingTurnsWaitingConceptsConsequenceIndiaChinaResistanceIndianNonviolenceTurkeysGovernanceIndonesiaNonviolent Resistance Author:Arundhati Roy
“Because of the caste system, because of the fact that there is no social link between those who make the decisions and those who suffer the decisions, the Indian government just goes ahead and does what it wants. The people also assume that this is their lot, their karma, what was written. It's quite an efficient way of doing things. Therefore, India has a very good reputation in the world as a democracy, as a government that cares, that has just got too much on its hands, whereas, in fact, it's actually creating the problems.” PeopleWorldWayWantDoeFactsProblemHandsGovernmentCareSufferingSocialDecisionDemocracyToo MuchWrittenCreatingIndiaAssumingVery GoodKarmaReputationIndianLinksEfficientCastesCaste SystemGood Reputation Author:Arundhati Roy
“Three-quarters of India lives on the edge of the market economy. You can't tell them that only those who can afford water can have it.” ThreeWaterEconomyIndiaEdgesQuartersMarket EconomyLife On The Edge Author:Arundhati Roy
“When I'm outside the cities I do feel optimistic. There is such grandeur in India and so much beauty.” FeelsCitiesIndiaOptimisticGrandeur Author:Arundhati Roy
“I know that a world in which countries are stockpiling nuclear weapons and using them in the ways that India and Pakistan and America do to oppress others and to deceive their own people is a dangerous world.” PeopleKnowsWorldWayCountryAmericaDangerousWeaponsIndiaNuclearNuclear WeaponsDeceivingPakistanDangerous WorldIndia And Pakistan Author:Arundhati Roy
“India is still flinching from a cultural insult, still looking for its identity.” StillsIdentityIndiaInsult Author:Arundhati Roy
“The religious rightwingism is directly linked to globalization and to privatization. When India is talking about selling its entire power sector to foreign multinationals, when the political climate gets too hot and uncomfortable, the government will immediately start saying, should we build a Hindu temple on the site of the Babri mosque? Everyone will go baying off in that direction. It's a game.” ShouldGovernmentPoliticalGamesReligiousTalkingIndiaHotClimateSellingUncomfortableTemplesSiteLinkedGlobalizationMosquesMultinationalsPrivatization Author:Arundhati Roy
“I am an artist and a writer, and I do think that one always places oneself in the picture to see where one fits. I left home when I was sixteen and lived in places where it was very easy for me to have fallen the other way. I could have been on the large convoy because I was a woman and I was alone. In India, that's not a joke. I could have ended up very, very badly. I'm lucky that I didn't.” ThinkingWayHas BeensHomeArtistLeftEasyFitLuckyJokesIndiaOneselfFallenCould Have BeenSixteen Author:Arundhati Roy
“Because of who I am and what place I have now in India, I'm petitioned all the time to get involved. It's exhausting and very difficult to have to say, 'Look, I'm only one person. I can't do everything.' I know that I don't want to be worn to the bone where I lose my sense of humor.” KnowsWantLooksPersonsI CanDifficultLosesInvolvedIndiaBonesWho I AmSense Of HumorWornGet InvolvedExhausting Author:Arundhati Roy
“Anyway, what is a country? When people say, "Tell me about India," I say, "Which India?.... The land of poetry and mad rebellion? The one that produces haunting music and exquisite textiles? The one that invented the caste system and celebrates the genocide of Muslims and Sikhs and the lynching of Dalits? The country of dollar billionaires? Or the one in which 800 million live on less than half-a-dollar a day? Which India?"” PeopleCountryHalfMillionsLandProduceIndiaMadDollarsCelebrateRebellionGenocideHauntingExquisiteBillionaireCastesLynchingCaste SystemTextiles Author:Arundhati Roy
“Just a few years ago India, Pakistan and Bangladesh were one country. Actually, we were many countries if you count the princely states.... Then the British drew a line, and now we're three countries, two of them pointing nukes at each other - the radical Hindu bomb and the radical Muslim bomb.” IfsYearsTwoCountryStatesThreeLinesYears AgoIndiaBritishRadicalBombsPakistanPointingBangladeshNukesIndia Pakistan Author:Arundhati Roy
“In India the new government - the members of the radical Hindu Right who want India to be a 'Hindu Nation' - they're bigots. Butchers. Massacres are their unofficial election campaigns - orchestrated to polarise communities and bring in the vote.” WantGovernmentNationsCommunityMembersVoteIndiaElectionCampaignsRadicalButchersBigotsMassacresNew Government Author:Arundhati Roy
“India's a very interesting place... there's no formal opposition, but there's genuine on-the-ground opposition.” InterestingIndiaGenuineOppositionFormalVery InterestingInteresting Places Author:Arundhati Roy
“When you think of how much violence, how much blood... how much has been destroyed to create the great nations, America, Australia, Britain, Germany, France, Belgium - even India, Pakistan. Having destroyed so much to make them, we must have nuclear weapons to protect them - and climate change to hold up their way of life... a two-pronged annihilation project.” ThinkingWayHas BeensTwoAmericaNationsViolenceBloodProtectProjectsWeaponsIndiaClimateClimate ChangeNuclearDestroyedFranceGermanyBritainAustraliaNuclear WeaponsPakistanAnnihilationBelgiumGreat NationsIndia Pakistan Author:Arundhati Roy
“I hope that that the people in the Occupy movement are politically aware enough to know that their being excluded from the obscene amassing of wealth of US corporations is part of the same system of the exclusion and war that is being waged by these corporations in places like India, Africa and the Middle East.” PeopleKnowsWarEnoughWealthMiddleMovementIndiaEastCorporationsMiddle EastExclusionExcludedObsceneOccupy Movement Author:Arundhati Roy
“We often confuse or loosely use the ideas of crony capitalism or neoliberalism to actually avoid using the word "capitalism", but once you've actually seen, let's say, what's happening in India and the United States - that this model of US economics packaged in a carton that says "democracy" is being forced on countries all over the world, militarily if necessary, has in the United States itself resulted in 400 of the richest people owning wealth equivalent [to that] of half of the population.” PeopleIfsWorldIdeasCountryStatesUseWealthUnitedHalfUnited StatesDemocracyModelsHappeningsCapitalismEconomicsIndiaPopulationNeoliberalismCroniesCrony Capitalism Author:Arundhati Roy
“In India, 100 of the richest people own assets worth 25% of the gross domestic product. There's something terribly wrong. No individual and no corporation should be allowed to amass that kind of unlimited wealth, including bestselling writers like myself, who are showered with royalties.” PeopleShouldKindIndividualWealthProductsIndiaIncludingCorporationsAssetsUnlimitedGrossRoyaltyGross Domestic Product Author:Arundhati Roy
“In the forests of central India and in many, many rural areas, a huge battle is being waged. Millions of people are being driven off their lands by mining companies, by dams, by infrastructure companies, and a huge battle is being waged. These are not people who have been co-opted into consumer culture, into the western notions of civilisation and progress. They are fighting for their lands and their livelihoods, refusing to be looted so that someone somewhere far away may "progress" at their cost.” PeopleMayHas BeensCultureFightingCompanyMillionsProgressLandHugeBattleCostAreasIndiaWesternNotionDrivenForestsConsumersFar AwayInfrastructureCivilisationLivelihoodMiningDamsRural AreasConsumer Culture Author:Arundhati Roy
“India has millions of internally displaced people. And now, they are putting their bodies on the line and fighting back. They are being killed and imprisoned in their thousands. Theirs is a battle of the imagination, a battle for the redefinition of the meaning of civilisation, of the meaning of happiness, of the meaning of fulfilment.” PeopleBodyFightingImaginationLinesMillionsBattleIndiaCivilisationFulfilmentFighting Back Author:Arundhati Roy
“In India, the poverty is so vast that the state cannot control it. It can beat people, but it can't prevent the poor from flooding the roads, the cities, the parks and railway station platforms.” PeopleStatesPoorCitiesPovertyBeatsIndiaParksStationsPlatformsRailwayFloodingRailway Station Author:Arundhati Roy
“In India, we have a right wing that is so vicious and so openly wicked, which is the Baratiya Janata party (BJP), and then we have the Congress party, which does almost worse things, but does it by night. And people feel that the only choices they have are to vote for this or for that. And my point is that, whoever you vote for, it doesn't have to consume all the oxygen in the political debate.” PeopleFeelsDoePoliticalNightChoicesPartyVoteIndiaWingsCongressDebateWickedViciousOxygenRight WingPolitical DebatesBjpCongress Party Author:Arundhati Roy
“The Congress has historically played covert communal politics in order to create what in India we call vote banks where you pit one community against another and so on in order to secure votes.” OrderPoliticsCommunityVoteIndiaCongressSecurePitsCovert Author:Arundhati Roy
“So far as we are concerned, there is not one word in the statements that I have made in this council which can be interpreted to mean that we will not honour international obligations. I want to say for the purpose of the record that there is nothing that has been said on behalf of the Government of India which in the slightest degree indicates that the Government of India or the Union of India will dishonour any international obligations it has undertaken.” WantMeanHas BeensMadeSaidGovernmentPurposeRecordsDegreesConcernedIndiaUnionsInternationalStatementsObligationHonourBehalfCouncilOne WordDishonour Author:Arundhati Roy
