Articles by: Javed Iqbal Wani

Understanding the Currency of Courage, Discipline, and Love in Contemporary Indian Politics: Lessons from Karnataka

Understanding the Currency of Courage, Discipline, and Love in Contemporary Indian Politics: Lessons from Karnataka

  The result of the 2023 Karnataka assembly elections has surprised those who, directly or indirectly, had already read its obituary. Congress has secured 136 seats out of 224, and the BJP has managed to retain only 64.  However, contrary to the observation of most commentators, Congress was successful not merely because of its local focus. In this article, I argue[Read More…]

by 15/05/2023 Comments are Disabled India
Remembering the Rashtrapita: Gandhi as an antidote to hatred and violence 

Remembering the Rashtrapita: Gandhi as an antidote to hatred and violence 

We are celebrating yet another Gandhi Jayanti. Given the significance that Mahatma Gandhi holds not only for Indians but globally, some introspection about the current state of affairs in India and Gandhi’s philosophy as a possible antidote to rapidly increasing hatred and violence is urgently required. Let me begin by using Dharma as an example. The contemporary fallacy of collapsing dharma into[Read More…]

by 03/10/2022 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Authoritarian ambitions with a democratic interpretation

Authoritarian ambitions with a democratic interpretation

The unveiling of the Subhash Chandra Bose statute by the Prime Minister of India marking the inauguration of the ‘Kartavya Path,’ the revamped Central Vista Avenue, has at least three objectives attached to it. One, it allows the BJP to add some momentum for the 2024 elections by staging the arrival of a ‘refreshed’ India. Second, it provides it with[Read More…]

by 13/09/2022 Comments are Disabled India
Farmers agitation: Democratic politics has trumped populism

Farmers agitation: Democratic politics has trumped populism

In the past one year, farmers of the country have demonstrated the force of popular determination against an arrogant and defiant government. The farmers’ movement has proved that the revolutionary spirit of the ‘peasant’ had not diminished with the arrival of new networks of capital. It has established that ‘peasant consciousness’ in the country remains intellectually sharp, socially sensitive and[Read More…]

by 11/12/2021 Comments are Disabled India
A new age of surveillance and control in India

A new age of surveillance and control in India

With the recent Pegasus scandal, the relationship between state surveillance and democratic practices are in sharp contention. It seems that control has become the sacrament of state in India based on a conception of sovereignty that operates by strictly regulating and punishing those considered as the foes of the regime. In India the key challenge it seems remains the decolonisation[Read More…]

by 01/08/2021 1 comment India
The BJP government is incapable of governance

The BJP government is incapable of governance

For the past six years, we have been told that India has got a strong government with a strong leader. The measurements of the Prime Minister’s chest became the centre of a political strategy that emphasised, what some saw as, his political strength and to resolve issues with an iron-fist approach. The onslaught of the pandemic and its consistent mismanagement[Read More…]

by 03/06/2021 Comments are Disabled India