Body, Nation and Resistance in the ...
This article is based on the 25th Chandrashekar...
Environment
Need for a law to regulate the use of groundwater
E A S Sarma | September 15, 2020
Brazil’s 63,000 Fires
Robert Hunziker | September 8, 2020
Plastic in every bite of commercial seafood, finds research
Countercurrents Collective | September 7, 2020
Featured Stories
World
Assange’s Tenth Day at the Old Bailey: Bolting Horses, Death Penalties and Plots of Eviction
September 21. Central Criminal Court, London: Today was one of reiteration and expansion. Computer scientist Christian Grothoff of the Bern University of Applied Sciences supplied the relevant chronology on what led to the publication of unredacted US State Department cables, the subject of such concern for the prosecution. This proved a mild taster of what was to come: the alleged[Read More…]
India
Before teaching in English medium, first improve the shoddy text books
The discussion on the new education policy so far seems to have omitted the subject of text books. The quality of most text books so far is considered quite poor, especially of books in English language for English medium students… This has been going on year after year, the same mistakes are repeated in next editions. Let me cite the[Read More…]
Globalisation
Globalization: a multifaceted exchange platform of healthcare
by Dr. Chandrima Chatterjee, Dr. Parul Malik and Dr. Arathi P Rao Globalization has been described by the economist Brian Easton [1] as “problematic”. He also mentions that often writers avoid explaining about globalization analytically but rather, relate it to a series of phenomena such as capital flow, international organizations and policies as the likes of “free trade”. There is[Read More…]
Human Rights
Increasing Incidence of Violence Against Women Forest Dwellers in Uttarakhand
MAHILA KISAN ADHIKAAR MANCH (MAKAAM) or Forum for Women Farmers’ Rights condemns and expresses deep concern over the increasing incidence of violence, harassment and atrocities against adivasi and other traditional forest dwellers especially women forest dwellers in Uttarakhand. The Forest Rights Act 2006 proclaims the responsibility of the state to defend and uphold the rights of Adivasis and Other Traditional[Read More…]
Imperialism
National (In)Security and the Pentagon Budget
A Post-Coronavirus Economy Can No Longer Afford to Put the Pentagon First The inadequate response of both the federal and state governments to the Covid-19 pandemic has had a devastating impact on the United States, creating what could only be called a national security crisis. More than 190,000 Americans are dead, approximately half of them people of color. Yelp data show that more than 132,000[Read More…]
Communal Harmony
Grooming Chimps and Grovelling Minorities- Is this the Dead-End?
Desmond Morris’s pithy observations in The Naked Ape may be considered obsolete in our times, when we are busy talking about posthumans and homo-roboticus; but I think, it still contains many nuggets of wisdom. Being a zoologist, he sees quite a lot of parallelisms, between, us naked apes, who at some point in our history, unilaterally proclaimed the shattering of[Read More…]
Climate Change
Fire and Fury Like the World Has Never Seen, 2020 Version
It was August 2017 and Donald Trump had not yet warmed up to Kim Jong-un, North Korea’s portly dictator. In fact, in typical Trumpian fashion, he was pissed at the Korean leader and, no less typically, he lashed out verbally, threatening that country with a literal hell on Earth. As he put it, “They will be met with fire and fury like[Read More…]
Environmental Protection
Need for a law to regulate the use of groundwater
Letter to the Prime Minister E.A.S.Sarma Maharanipeta Visakhapatnam To Shri Narendra D Modi Prime Minister Dear Shri Modiji, India’s groundwater resources have come under severe stress as a result of increasing pressure on the same for urban water needs in cities and towns and from irrigation requirements in the rural areas. In many parts of the country, the rate of[Read More…]
Counter Solutions
Cutting Back
I am adamant about this topic. I know that the only way forward is to limit ourselves in resource and energy use. In that vein, I wrote to the USA Sierra group that was touting electric cars: “I respectfully disagree with you. From where does the majority of our electricity derive? The answer is fossil fuels. That is obvious. So[Read More…]
Resource Crisis
Business-as-usual porn – or, We need to talk about collapse
I think we need to talk openly and calmly about the possibility of societal or civilizational collapse arising from humanity’s present predicaments. And that’s mostly what I want to pursue in this post – not so much what the likelihood or the underlying mechanisms of collapse might be, but the idea that it would be useful if, as a society,[Read More…]
Alternative Energy
SMART? – Solar In Massachusetts
Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources (“DOER”) will finalize by July 15 regulations doubling the size of MA SMART solar photovoltaic program from 1,600 to 3,200 megawatts (MW). On the surface this is a reasonable, if limited, step forward. But like most things, the devil and long-term consequences are in the details. Unless changed by DOER, or the legislature, the latest[Read More…]
Patriarchy
Kudumbashree: Empowering Women
As the Lok Sabha polls in 2019 showed an overall improvement in the political representation of women, it became obvious that we have come a long way but there is still a long stretch to cover. In all of our misplaced understanding of just “helping” women to ensure we empower them, we forget that empowerment lies in building agency, above[Read More…]
Palestine
Apartheid Reaffirmed
The accepted definition of Apartheid by the United Nations and the International criminal court is as follows: ‘Apartheid refers to the implementation and maintenance of a system of legalized racial segregation in which one racial group is deprived of political and civil rights. Apartheid is a crime against humanity punishable under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. It[Read More…]
South Asia
Sri Lanka’s Boiling Tamils And Failing Tamil Political Leaders
There is no denying of the fact that the Tamils in Sri Lanka have been at the receiving end by the successive Governments in power and targeted in the agenda of GENOCIDE including structural GENOCIDE since the time of independence in 1948. Their history since then is dotted with state discrimination and marginalization aided with legislations like the SINHALA ONLY[Read More…]
Annihilate Caste
Why is Bengal still Caste-less?
In early September, circles from the Bengali academia and Left political spectrum, strongly vocalized their seemingly disgruntled voices against the trolling of Professor Maroona Murmu, Assistant Professor from the Department of History at Jadavpur University. At the same time, many of them also claimed to be “astonished” at something of this nature happening in Bengal. Soon after my arrival in[Read More…]
Life/Philosophy
The End of Reality?
In 1888, the year before he went insane, Friedrich Nietzsche wrote the following in Twilight of the Idols: We have got rid of the real world: what world is left? The apparent world perhaps? … But no! Along with the real world we’ve done away with the apparent world as well. So, if you feel you also may be going insane in[Read More…]
Arts/Literature
You Can Ask Me….But
Ask me How I’m doing What I’m thinking about But Ask me What the future holds Where I’ll be But Ask me About the pain About the sadness But Ask me Why I’m hurting Why I can’t move But Ask me About my parents About my kids But It isn’t like The Weather The Game The Show So You Don’t[Read More…]
Book Review
Black Wave – Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the Forty-Year Rivalry
Black Wave – Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the Forty-Year Rivalry That Unravelled Culture, Religion, and Collective Memory in the Middle East. Kim Ghattas. Henry Holt & Company, NewYork, 2020. Among the many books analyzing the Middle East, Kim Ghattas’ Black Wave is outstanding – that not necessarily being a good thing. It is very good as it presents what the[Read More…]
