INTERNATIONAL PEOPLE'S TRIBUNAL ON HUMAN RIGHTS AND JUSTICE IN INDIAN-ADMINISTERED KASHMIR (IPTK)
www.kashmirprocess.org

Re.: Kashmir Tribunal, Arundhati Roy, and Peace and Justice Grant

On March 26, 2010, Haymarket Books hosted renowned author and global justice activist, Arundhati Roy, in San Francisco, California, reading from her latest collection of essays, Field Notes on Democracy: Listening to Grasshoppers.

Arundhati Roy dedicated this event as a benefit for the International People's Tribunal on Human Rights and Justice in Indian-administered Kashmir (IPTK).

On behalf of IPTK, Co-founders and Co-conveners Dr. Angana Chatterji (Professor, Anthropology, California Institute of Integral Studies, CIIS) and Advocate Parvez Imroz (Founder, Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society) convey their sincere gratitude to Ms. Roy for her incisive solidarity, and for generously volunteering to gift the proceeds from the March 26th event to IPTK.

The event was attended by approximately 1000 people from the San Francisco Bay Area, and co-sponsored by various groups, including Against the Cuts, Center for Economic Research and Social Change, Code Pink Women for Peace, Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology at CIIS, Middle East Children's Alliance, National Radio Project, Oakland Institute, Producers of Making Contact, Student Alliance at CIIS, and Voices of a People's History of the United States. Dr. Chatterji and Advocate Imroz convey their heartfelt appreciation to Anthony Arnove of Haymarket Books and members of the Haymarket staff, David Barsamian of Alternative Radio, Richard Shapiro of CIIS, and eminent public intellectual Alice Walker.

Peace and Justice Grant
IPTK will use the proceeds from this event to institute the Peace and Justice Grant for Scholarship and the Arts in Indian-administered Kashmir. [Note: This is in keeping with IPTK's approach to finance the work of the Tribunal through the income of its office-bearers.] The Grant will be housed at CIIS, with the kind support of CIIS President Joseph Subbiondo, to whom Dr. Chatterji and Advocate Imroz extend their thanks.

The Peace and Justice Grant will be awarded to individuals residing in Indian-administered Kashmir. The Grant will support critical and meaningful contributions in scholarship and the arts that research, document, and give creative expression to life, culture, and present history in Kashmir, in ways that evoke imagination and possibility for social justice, and ethical and peaceable conflict resolution. For details, please visit www.kashmirprocess.org.

The People's Tribunal
IPTK was instituted on April 05, 2008, by Dr. Angana Chatterji and Advocate Parvez Imroz, together with Gautam Navlakha (Editorial Consultant, Economic and Political Weekly), Zahir-Ud-Din (Vice-President, Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society), Advocate Mihir Desai (Lawyer, Mumbai High Court and Supreme Court of India), and Khurram Parvez (Programme Coordinator, Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society).

IPTK is constituted as a people's collective, convened in alliance by persons from Indian-administered Kashmir and India. Its purpose is to inquire into the culture of grief in Indian-administered Kashmir, and the architecture and fabric of militarization, regularized violences, and crimes against humanity, and the resultant and continuing cycles of repression.

Note: Information regarding grant applications will be available on July 1, 2010, please check back then.