All
Set For World Social Forum Meet
By Kalpana Sharma
The
Hindu
16 January, 2004
Only
a city the size of Mumbai could absorb an additional 75,000 people and
not fall apart. That is precisely the process that has already begun
here as delegates from 130 countries social activists, trade
unionists, feminists, environmentalists, peaceniks, human rights campaigners
and anti-globalisation activists arrive to participate in one
of the largest gatherings the city has seen, the World Social Forum
(WSF), which opens on January 16.
This is the first
time the WSF is being held outside Porto Allegre in Brazil, where for
three years equally large numbers from around the world gathered and
articulated their vision of an alternative to neo-liberal globalisation
under the over-arching slogan "Another World is Possible."
The six-day forum
has lined up a galaxy of speakers for its opening and closing plenaries
and panel discussions. They include the Nobel Peace Prize winner from
Iran, Shirin Ebadi, the former United Nations Commissioner for Human
Rights, Mary Robinson, Algeria's first President, Ahmed Ben Bella, the
French farmer and anti-globalisation activist, Jose Bove, the Pakistan
human rights activist, Asma Jehangir, the Director-General of the International
Labour Organisation, Juan Somavia, and the Nobel laureate and former
Chief Economist of the World Bank, Joseph Stiglitz.
From India, the
speakers at the 20 conferences and 800 seminars and round-tables include
the former President, K.R. Narayanan, Captain Laxmi Sehgal, Arundhati
Roy, Medha Patkar and the Marxist thinker, Prabhat Patnaik. Also, some
190 mass and social organisations will participate in the hundreds of
parallel events that have been planned over the six days.
All these will be
held at the massive NESCO grounds in Goregaon, a northern suburb. An
area accustomed to trade exhibitions is being rapidly transformed into
an arena where panel discussions, conferences, cultural programmes,
art exhibitions and film shows will take place simultaneously. Huge
meeting halls that can accommodate over 10,000 people are being assembled,
simultaneous translation facilities are being rigged up, a media centre
to cater to over 2,000 Indian and foreign journalists is being put together
and two stages and an amphitheatre are being erected. An extraordinary
array of over 100 theatre groups from India and 30 from overseas and
well-known performing artists and groups such as the rock band Junoon
from Pakistan, the Brazilian singer and currently Culture Minister,
Gilberto Gil, the classical singer, Shubha Mudgal, and the rock group,
Indian Ocean, will perform.
Literally across
the road, a parallel and separate meet, `Mumbai Resistance 2004 Against
Imperialist Globalisation and War,' has been organised by 300 organisations
from India and abroad. The organisers were once a part of the WSF process
but are now critical of it. They have chosen to hold a separate meeting
on similar themes with many participants that are expected to attend
both events.