Echoes of Mullivaikal in Gaza
The daily death and destruction in Gaza has evoked painful memories for Tamils everywhere of a similar carnage half a world away in Mullivaikal, the coastal village that became the…
Satya Sagar
Give Israel and Palestine EU Membership And Implement A Marshall Plan
A two-state solution, with both Israel and the newly formed nation of Palestine getting automatic membership of the European Union. Plus, a Marshall Plan-like initiative funded by the US, UK…
Yes, there was once a place called Gaza
"The blood of innocents flowed freely like a river swollen with injustice," and "for days the city endured terror, misdeeds darker than night itself descended." That was the renowned Urdu…
The Israeli model vs the Global Intifada
For all those who think that Israel is run by the most despicable, racist and repressive regime in the world here is some very bad news indeed. Not only are…
India’s ‘encounter’ with Barbarism
The brutal murders of the politician Atiq Ahmed and his brother Ashraf in police custody and that too in front of rolling TV cameras corroborates the worst kept secret about…
Is India still a Republic or a Monarchy?
On the 74th anniversary of its formation a specter haunts the Indian Republic – the specter of Monarchy. For those who want to see or hear or feel it, the…
Sasi’s Dream: Defeat the BJP in 2024!
Towards the last phase of his life K.P.Sasi, the filmmaker, cartoonist and activist, obsessed about a one-point agenda he wanted all his friends, colleagues, contacts to work towards. To ‘Defeat…
Farewell to Sasi etta, brother K.P. Sasi
Our beloved K.P.Sasi is no more. Filmmaker, cartoonist, writer, mentor, friend and above all tireless activist championing the cause of every underdog, Sasi breathed his last, mid-afternoon this Christmas day…
It’s as if the French Revolution never happened…
According to legend, Zhou Enlai, the first premier of the People's Republic of China, when asked what he thought was the impact of the French Revolution of 1789, is supposed to…
Mikhail Gorbachev’s lessons for the Indian Left
The recent passing of Mikhail Gorbachev triggered memories from the mid-eighties, when as a young communist party activist, I would be constantly confronted with the question, ‘Why are you still…
And here’s to you Mrs Draupadi Murmu!
Dear Mrs Murmu Your nomination by the ruling party of Hindutva to be the next President of India fills the hearts of all Adivasis around India with great joy. At…
Let us convert and get converted
I have a confession to make. That I have been converted many times. From one faith to another to yet another, endlessly. And I simply love it. Sometimes I got…
Wishing You All a Very Nutritious New Year!
It has taken my slow brain a long time to figure it out but finally, as 2021 comes to an end, I have found a sure shot way of bringing…
Hindutva resurrects India’s thuggee tradition
There has been some heated discussion in recent weeks in India about whether the term Hindutva is the same as Hinduism or not. For those supporting the ruling BJP regime…
Omicron: Much sound with little light
Origin: Unknown Crime record: Unknown Armed or unarmed: Unknown Capabilities: Unknown Motive: Unknown Category: Extremely dangerous! If that were a profile of a criminal suspect, the cop writing it would…
The human body as a synonym for Planet Earth
Note: This article is based on a presentation made on 25 October 2021 at the Congreso de Salud Socioambiental organised by the Instituto de Salud Socioambiental, Rosario, Argentina It is…
Between Vaccine and the Ventilator
“I am planning to get my Covid vaccine shot this week” I told a very dear German friend of mine the other day over the phone. “No! Don’t do that!”…
Of Father Stan Swamy, humans and other species
A few years ago, on a visit to La Paz, the Bolivian capital set high in the Andean mountains, I spotted a board inside a restaurant that said ‘All Humans…
From Rumsfeld, the ‘ruthless little bastard’, to Remdesivir
What connects the US invasion of Iraq in 2003 to Remdesivir, the blockbuster medicine widely used during the ongoing Covid pandemic? First is the fact that both are based on…
The Rumsfeld Rules
Editors note: The death of former US Secretary of State Donald Rumsfeld on 29 June marks the end of a man who was one of the main architects and executors…
A Second Wave of India’s Emergency
Why should a country in the grip of a deadly wave of Covid-19, with people dying all around, remember the Emergency, a nationwide suspension of democracy, that happened almost half…
When Cow Dung Meets Coronavirus
“Cow dung, cow urine didn’t work. Groundless argument. Tomorrow I will eat fish”. In mid-May this year, this simple Facebook post about the futility of bovine waste as a cure…
Caste, Class and India’s Covid Catastrophe
Covid-19 patients dying on the streets gasping for oxygen. Hundreds of wailing, desperate folks searching for hospital beds to access treatment. Even the dead denied dignified funerals, their bodies dumped…
India’s Rihanna and Ganesha Syndrome
You can call it the ‘Rihanna and Ganesha Syndrome’ – the inability of some folks to focus upon the truly divine and get easily distracted by imaginary demonesses. In India…
Not just Rihanna or Greta, Indian farmers are inspiring the world
Rihanna, Susan Sarandon, Greta Thunberg, John Cusack - the list of well-known celebrities endorsing the struggle of Indian farmers against the country’s new corporate-authored farm laws is growing by the…
It’s Facebook versus India’s Farmers
The tug-of-war between Indian farmers and government over new laws facilitating corporate takeover of the country’s agriculture is getting uglier by the hour and likely to get quite bloody too.…
Why India’s farm laws will never be rolled back
In the murky netherworld of the mafia the Godfather is the one who speaks softly, but whose words carry the deadliest intent. On 15 January as yet another round of…
Vandalizing democracy, the American way
A popular joke among leftists in the eighties was to ask why there had never been a military coup in Washington D.C. The answer: Because it doesn’t have a US…
Happy New French Revolution!
As 2021 arrives I am not planning to wish anyone a ‘Happy New Year’ while everything wrong with the world remains deeply entrenched. And anyway, nothing really changes with the…
Keep Countercurrents Alive ! An Appeal From Satya Sagar
For nearly two decades now Countercurrents has provided millions of readers around the world with deep insights and analysis of news, events, trends that are usually ignored by mainstream media.…
The Corporate Cannibals
First they came for the corner shops And I did not speak out Because I was not a shopkeeper Then they came for the taxis And I did not speak…
Indian farmers challenge return of ‘Company Raj’
The ongoing siege of the national capital New Delhi by hundreds of thousands of farmers represents, perhaps, the biggest revolt against ‘Company Raj’ since India’s First War of Independence way…
Can the world be changed?
Can the world be changed in any fundamental way or not? Will the methods one uses to change it end up doing more harm than good? Should one mind one’s…
A dystopian template for India’s future
Murders, kidnapping, rape, police atrocities, sectarian violence, lynch mobs on the prowl. Welcome to a typical day in the life of Uttar Pradesh, India’s most populous, lawless and politically important…
Reimagining National Liberation
The dismantling of European colonialism in Asia and Africa seven decades ago and then the collapse of the Soviet Union in the late eighties led to the formation of many…
Why India needs a rural uprising
“Today, the villages are dung heaps. Tomorrow they will be like tiny gardens of Eden where dwell highly intelligent folk whom no one can deceive or exploit”. Mahatma Gandhi, writing…
Body, Nation and Resistance in the times of COVID-19
This article is based on the 25th Chandrashekar Memorial Lecture delivered on 20 September 2020. The original lecture was delivered in Hindi and the event was organized by Punashcha, the…
The day justice got cooked
The Chief Chaddis smirked, stroking his little beard menacingly. This was the moment he and his fellow Chaddis had waited for and chewed so much cud over. They had finally…
India with Chinese Characteristics
As India and China squabble over a tiny but strategic strip of land along their long border, some may be tempted to classify this as a clash between a democracy…
India’s Deadly Cytokine Storm
Two months after imposition of the most stringent and large-scale lockdown in the world, with the pandemic still undefeated, it is the Indian Republic that is looking more and more…
The Coolies of Kishkindha
It was early summer, but the sun was hardly very hot for the time of the year. There was even a pleasant breeze blowing and the path ahead was a…
The Corona Chicken Farm
“They have decided to extend the lockdown by another three weeks!” said Chicken Number One, who was always the first with the news. The information set off a wave of…
King Covid Rules
It is a capricious little virus with a funny crown and a flimsy protein coat, zipping across the planet, leaving behind a trail of utter confusion, death and destruction. And…
One Pandemic, Many Possibilities
A month ago, if someone had said ‘social distancing’, I would have really thought they were talking about the Indian caste system with its perverse idea of untouchability. ‘Lockdown’ till…
SARS, Wars And The Farce
Note: The global hype and scare around the coronavirus outbreak is reminiscent of similar panic over SARS, avian flu and swine flu in the last decade and half. Driven by…
Why India needs Periyar today
In the ongoing movement against the Citizenship Amendment Act the images of Gandhi, Ambedkar and even Bhagat Singh have been put forward as symbols of religious tolerance, non-violence, Dalit empowerment…
Dismantling the Indian Republic
On 26 January 2020, as India marks 70 years of becoming a modern Republic, it also faces its biggest crisis as a democratic federation of religious, linguistic, ethnic and regional…
No Nazis this New Year
If the record of December 2019 is anything to go by 2020 promises to be one of great hope for all Indians interested in preserving their country’s traditions of secularism,…
Winning The Land, Losing The Country
There are many dreadful things we all know about human societies and institutions, which are absolutely true and yet we like to think otherwise, lest we come across as being…
A Brief History of Politeness
From political speech to social media tirades, for half a decade or more now, the use of rude language, gestures and threats has become ubiquitous around the globe. The complete…
The Wisdom of Ganesh Gaitonde – Part I
Note: Ganesh Gaitonde is a fictional character from the Netflix series Sacred Games, but that does not make him any less real than anyone else on the planet. Warning: Profanity…
Kashmir: Modi’s ‘Bangladesh Moment’?
If any confirmation was needed Narendra Modi is determined to cast himself as a carbon copy of Indira Gandhi- albeit one with a venomous, communal edge – you need not…
The Age of Anything Goes
A blond-haired US President openly hinting only white immigrants can be true American citizens, blue-eyed Nazis marching boldly on the streets of Europe, brattish Brexiteers in Britain harking back to…
Killing Fields of Indian Healthcare
“Medicine is a social science and politics is nothing else but medicine on a large scale”. Rudolf Virchow, 1821-1902 In recent days India’s health system – never the world’s best…
‘Global Warming meets ‘Gobar Rashtra’
As I glanced through the doom and gloom of the daily news one morning I came upon a dire new report on climate change, which predicts the human species may…
Axis Of The Apocalyptic
Note: On 6 June 2019 India voted with Israel in the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) to prevent a Palestinian “human rights” organisation called Shahed, which Jerusalem insists…
The Bacteria as Guru
Ever since the ‘germ theory of disease’ was propounded by Louis Pasteur two hundred years ago, the world has understood bacteria as the cause of numerous infections, many of them…
Phantom of the Vedic Opera Returns
In an era where national elections have become a strange cross between an episode of Big Boss and twenty-twenty cricket, it has become quite difficult to take the end results…
Sri Lanka’s Sacred Games | Satya Sagar
In the times we live in, where smoke and mirrors are the world’s two chief weapons of war, fiction is a better guide to contemporary events than ‘facts’ presented by…
Two Curries And A War
All of Tamatarland was in great turmoil. There had been a vile attack on its security forces by a suicide-bomber, who had sneaked past dozens of heavily guarded checkpoints and…
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