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Over the past ten months, at least 12 persons have succumbed to hunger in Jharkhand. Instead of taking action against functionaries whose lapses have led to these deaths and measures to improve the situation of food security in the state, Jharkhand government has denied hunger as the cause of any of these deaths and absolved itself of any blame. Instead,[Read More…]
The Credibility of India’s top institutions has lately suffered affecting governance and democracy in the country. Its strong indication came in the form of the impeachment motion against the chief justice of India which was rejected by the Vice president and was subsequently challenged in the highest Court. When the case challenging legality of the vice president’s action came before[Read More…]
A Muslim man was lynched to death following a rumour of cow slaughter in a village in Pilkhua near Hapur district of western UP. The man named Kashim died in the hospital in the course of treatment. The condition of the other person is also serious. A trivial feud, where men were reportedly driving out stray cows from fields, aggravated into[Read More…]
The prominent journalist and editor, Shujaat Bukhari was leaving work when he and his two bodyguards were shot and killed. Suffice to say newspapers are the lifeblood of democracy and Indian administered Kashmir under the decades-long grip of a half-million strong security force has a questionable claim. Yet brave journalists, unafraid, write and sometimes pay the consequences. Following Mr. Bukhari’s[Read More…]
I have never liked the rhetorical politics of Arvind Kejriwal. In fact the seed that they sow in 2011 resulted in the fascist take over of this country. Kejriwal wanted the country to become a gram panchayat at the Ramleela maidan and decisions were taken on the voice vote. All the power elite of the upper caste suddenly turned revolutionary.[Read More…]
In order to make sense of the issue on the table, let us first try to arrange the events in (rough) chronological order. I. Here’s a news report carried by the ToI, June 6 web edition, which informs: <<Human rights activist Rona Jacob Wilson was arrested from South Delhi early on Wednesday [i.e. June 6 2018] in connection with the[Read More…]
“..I am afraid I have no faith in astrology and certainly I should not like to fix up national programmes in accordance with the dictates of astrologers…” Jawaharlal Nehru (In a letter to Rajendra Prasad, who had objected to January 26, 1950 as the date for inaugurating the republic on astrological grounds. Page 77, Volume 2, Jawaharlal Nehru, A Biography, OUP,[Read More…]
In 1947 India was divided by the foreign rulers by playing a game of divide and rule to which the religious fundamentalists fell prey. India and Pakistan since then have a checkered history and uneasy relationship sometimes climaxing in wars and violent conflagrations. While the governments prefer to maintain adversarial relationship, which now sustains certain vested interests on both sides,[Read More…]
Two Muslim men were lynched on suspicion of stealing cattle in Jharkhand’s Godda district on Wednesday morning. Residents of Dullu village caught hold of the two victims – Sirabuddin Ansari (35) and Murtaza Ansari (30) – and accused them of stealing 13 buffaloes from one Munshi Murmu on Tuesday night. “Villagers claim that that they found the missing buffaloes in[Read More…]
India is home to one-fifth of the world’s population which includes a third of the world’s poor and one-eighth of the world’s elderly. Most of them spend their whole lives as informal workers and have no retirement security other than the hope that their children will care for them in their old age. This arrangement worked well as long as[Read More…]
A critique of RSS needs to go beyond the current pattern. The contemporary liberal and left critique has been primarily targeted at their core concept of Hindutva. It is argued that Hindutva as an idea goes against the basic ethos of secularism, pluralism and ideals of the constitution. Commentaries and critics point as to how it is anti-Dalit, anti-minority and[Read More…]
The union government’s proposal of lateral entry of persons from “private sector companies, consultancy firms and international or multinational organisations”, as Joint Secretary (JS) is to “bring[ing] in fresh ideas and new approaches to governance and also to augment manpower”. [“Private sector employees can now apply for top government posts“; <https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/government-notifies-10-positions-for-lateral-entry-as-joint-secretaries/articleshow/64527221.cms>; Economic Times, June 10, 2018]. This would be unexceptionable[Read More…]
Mr. T. Sakhrie, one of the first Naga intellectuals, a philosopher and a great Naga-nationalist leader of his era who sacrificed his life for the freedom and rights of Nagas stood true till his last breath to his ideologies and convictions which reflect in his quote that further produced verbatim. He said, “Truly we are a peculiar people.[Read More…]
Former president Pranab Mukherjee gave a speech in the RSS meeting on Thursday the 7th of June in Nagpur. Now, let me clarify that this is not a speech on the speech but in fact an article on the speech/ opinions flung around, before and after the speech. When it was announced that Mukherjee had accepted the invite from the[Read More…]
11th of June, 2018 should be considered as the darkest day in the constitutional history of India. It is the day when BJP government through the Department of Personnel and Training opened up the doors to the prestigious ‘higher’ civil services of India to the private sector through lateral entry scheme. Central Government through its nation-wide advertisement has call for[Read More…]
The cruel lynching of two innocent and budding youth in Kacharigaon village under Dokmoka police station of Assam’s Karbi Anglong district is the harsh reminder of the state in which we are living today. In last couple of years India’s public spaces have turned into squares of mediaeval Europe in which people were publicly executed for ‘heresy’, ‘witchcraft’, for petty[Read More…]
In an era of profound distortion of news and storytelling, the most pertinent question that is being asked is; ‘what is News now’? Notwithstanding the debatable facts, the fact remains that we are witnessing new trends and upheavals in the media industry particularly transformative issues in the business of news. Today we are facing an increasing focus on the intersection[Read More…]
India’s eager quest for economic dynamism has been severely stifled by chronic corruption. The country needs to urgently modernize its institutions and end the culture of rent seeking and cutting corners if it is to allow the economic wheels to roll seamlessly. Corruption is both anti-national and anti-poor because the resources meant for poverty alleviation schemes get siphoned off by[Read More…]
BJP’s chain of defeat which started with Gorakhpur and Phoolpur in Uttar Pradesh bye elections has extended to defeat in Kairana and Noorpur. It has broken the invincibility myth of Modi and Amit Shah. If the opposition parties succeed in joining hands to get rid of unprecedented danger to basic democratic values, institutions, society, culture and civilization created during[Read More…]
Most recently,the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill has been the talk of every nook and corner of the state with people from all walks of life joining the bandwagon and raising voices against the ill-fated bill.The state has witnessed severe protest over the past few weeks and protesting slogans even beat the deep blowing horns and revving engines of lumbering trucks on[Read More…]
It is said that the India is a cradle of civilization that has been following the ‘SANATANA’ Dharma that teaches the principles of Equality and Brotherhood. Vasudhaiv Kutumbakam- ‘The Entire Earth is my Family” has been the celebrated Sanskrit verse that most of the Indians have been taught in the school. “Saare Jaha se Acha, Hindostan Hamara” has been proudly[Read More…]
Indian farmers are on a 10-day long nationwide strike demanding fair prices for their produce and implementation of the Swaminathan Commission recommendations and farm loan waivers among other things. They are throwing vegetables and pouring milk on the road the farmers are letting out their grievances. The farmers are also preventing the movement of their produce to cities. This has[Read More…]
By 2050, if current policies continue, India could have numerous mega-cities with up to 30-40 million inhabitants and just two to three hundred million people (perhaps 15-20% of the population) left in an emptied-out countryside. Given current trends in the job market, it could mean tens of millions of city-based rural migrants without much work: victims of the ill thought out policies we currently see[Read More…]
The election results in Kairana bye elections comes as a welcome development. The ideological investment made into the constituency to create a myth of the Hindu exodus due to criminal Muslim activities did not pay the electoral dividends. This is despite the Modi, Adityanath and Amit Shah Combine at the helm of campaigning and all out efforts to polarise. Neither[Read More…]
The Kannada saying “murthi chikkadaadaru keerthi doddadu” (meaning that even if the physical form is diminutive, the virtue is great), applies to Lal Bahadur Shastri who, as prime minister, led India with remarkable initiative and verve in the 1965 war against Pakistan. It was he who coined the slogan “Jai Jawan Jai Kisan”, in the full understanding that the Jawan[Read More…]
After the massive protest on 1st May (Labor Day) for “equal pay for equal work” now Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) contractual staff facing new problem, if they will not collect target amount in a day from the duty they will be punished and also will give the fine. Chandra Prakash is a bus conductor, on 16 may, he just earn[Read More…]
Kairana results have signalled to the mighty that the public can wash them out in the 2019 elections. For the first time, RSS spokes person was speaking that government’s come and go but we must protect institutions. He was defending election commission but how come the Sangh Parivar now saying this. Why is Pranab Mukherjee invited. Why did the Sangh[Read More…]
India, a complex, beautiful and enchanting land, a melting pot of innumerable cultures, religions, ethnicities and traditions. India, a society deeply rooted in tolerance, compassion and forbearance. India, a land where the legends of Akbar’s justice, Shahjahan’s love, Prithvi Raj’s valor, Chanakya’s wisdom, live in every household. India, a land which gave birth to the concept of ahinsa, a land[Read More…]
The current Government came to power with the slogans of ‘Ache Din’ and ‘Sabka saath, Sabka vikas’ in which promises of better days and an inclusive model of development was promised. Lot of public relations exercises through advertisements, interviews in government favouring news channels tried to project its ‘development’ orientation. In reality, the travel made thus far shows a different[Read More…]
After Raigad, Jaitapur (Maharashtra), Kalinganagar, Niyamgiri, Gandhamardhan, Dhinkia and Khandadhar (Odisha), Nandigram, Singur (West Bengal), Dandakaranya, Raipur (Chhatishgarh), Jharkhand’s Saranda, MP’s Singrouli, Kovvada, Sompeta (Andhra Pradesh) and Koodankulam and Neduvasal (Tamil Nadu), the recent unfortunate events at the copper smelter plant of Sterlite Industries at Tuticorin bring out the basic issue back to the table. Can the state agencies and[Read More…]
The world’s investment leader, Warren Buffett, once said, “It’s only when the tide goes out that you realise who has been swimming naked”. When the banking system hit the rocks and the tide turned, the naked were caught disrobed. Similarly, sometimes it takes a pitch-black economy to reveal who and what in the financial firmament really shines. It is only[Read More…]
In what could be a bombshell in Indian journalism Cobrapost, an investigative news portal on Friday May 25 posted ‘sting’ videos to show executives of media houses discussing lucrative offers to promote communal content and criticise Opposition leaders In more than 30 videos posted Cobrapost showed virtually all major media outlets falling over each other to accept lucrative offers to[Read More…]
The mystery of the police firing in Tuticorin (Thoothukudi) has deepened with the emergence of a video in which snipers are seen shooting from atop a vehiccle at the crowd. 12 protesters died in the shooting on Tuesday ,May 22, 2018. They were on a protest march demanding the closure of Sterlite Copper, a Vedanta group copper smelter unit in[Read More…]
With the resignation of the BJP’s BS Yeddyurappa as Chief Minister just before a trust vote Karnataka’s political cliffhanger might have ended, at least for time being, but the power and role of Governor in the formation of a government in the eventof a fractured verdict willcontinue to be debated for some time to come. The validity of the[Read More…]
This reflective piece is the second within a week. It comes out of anguish and a search for political relevance in times such as this. It also comes as a response to queries from friends overseas. Theatre of the Absurd: The 19th of May 2018 was the culmination of a Theatre of the Absurdin Karnataka, performed at the VidhanaSoudha in[Read More…]
In a recent case at Uttarakhand High Court at the end of April 2018 a person accused under the Indian Penal Code of cheating, of being party to a criminal conspiracy, of wrongfully confining a person, of receiving and detaining against his will a person as a slave, and also of rendering his services for purposes of transplantation and[Read More…]
UDALGURI,Assam ,May 21: The Adivasi community of state whose fate remains locked decades after the Britshers left them in tea gardens of state are plagued with innumerous socio-economic hardships. In the ‘labour lines’ of tea gardens, in Udalguri of Assam merriment begins as soon as the sun goes down. There is not much by way of entertainment so ‘making merry’[Read More…]
It was yet another dark day for people living on the bloody line dividing Jammu and Kashmir. On Friday, fire-spewing mortar guns that have been thunderously roaring like man eaters for past seventy years devoured ten more human beingsand wounded dozens critically- perhaps disabled for life. Four civilians including a husband and wife and a Border Security Soldier where killed[Read More…]
UDALGURI,Assam,May 20: Though the Britishers left the nation, and India attained independence, one community whose fate remained locked and unchanged decades after decades, are the Adivasi community brought for working in tea gardens of Assam.They continue to remain under the grip of deprivation, humiliation and exploitation by the tea garden companies, their authority members and even the government.Besides numerous socio-political,[Read More…]
A Muslim man accused of killing a cow was beaten to death by a mob in central India, police said Sunday, the latest vigilante murder over the animal considered sacred by Hindus. Siraj Khan, a 45-year-old tailor, was attacked in the Satna district of Madhya Pradesh state early Friday and died at the scene, local police official Arvind Tiwari told[Read More…]
Today further decline of democracy in India was prevented when Mr. Yeddyurappa the BJP CM in Karnataka resigned even not facing the trust vote due to lack of sufficient support. Mr. B S Yeddyurappa was administered oath of Chief Minister ship two days back when Governor invited him to form the government rejecting the claim of JD-S and Congress which[Read More…]
Despite the spectacular strides made in economic growth and having a technological boom, India still continues to struggle to attain freedom from hunger. It is bearing witness to a triple burden of malnutrition—the coexistence of undernutrition, micronutrient deficiencies, and overnutrition. According to the Economic Survey (2017-18), child and maternal malnutrition posed the most challenging health risk of our times. India[Read More…]
Sanitation is the key to proper hygiene, which is essential for a health and safety of the public. India’s record, especially when it comes to sanitation, has been abysmal so far. According to the World Health Organization and the United Nations Children’s Fund Joint Monitoring Report (2017), more than half of the open defecation that occurs anywhere in the world[Read More…]
Despite all the tall claims of development by authorities in India, the data from Government bodies shows that there are little, if any, improvements in tackling alarmingly high levels of malnutrition. Add to this the worrisome fact of a sharp increase in the indebtedness of households and the situation becomes even bleaker. The data from the National Family Health Survey[Read More…]
‘Why call comedians to comedy shows in TV, when these BJP leaders can put up a far better show?’ That is one of the social media trolls which have been doing the rounds about BJP leaders in Kerala whose histrionics on primetime TV news debates have spawned an avalanche of memes and trolls. Satire-happy social media users attest that[Read More…]
BJP has almost sealed victory in Karnataka state assembly election, giving a thumping beating to the Congress party. With the vitory in Karnataka the right wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has found a foothold in South India. Vidya Bhushan Rawat analyses the reasons for the BJP victory and what lies ahead for India As a nation these are defining moments.[Read More…]
The recently launched Ayushman Bharat, also known as the National Health Protection Scheme (or even Modicare in popular parlance!) has two objectives — first, creating a network of health and wellness centers to bring all-inclusive primary healthcare close to the community, and secondly, providing insurance cover to 40 per cent of India’s population, that is most deprived, for secondary and[Read More…]
No other fascist organization, in the present world, can beat Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) in demagogy, double-speak and unabashed use of conspiracies. A leading Indian English daily, in the aftermath of 2002 genocide of Muslims in Gujarat, candidly wrote that in case of the RSS, what George Orwell termed as “doublespeak” would be an understatement.[i] It stands true always in[Read More…]
Mohammad Gulzar (48), a resident of Nai Basti, Jamia Nagar, was a small time horse cart rider, until a few months ago. He earned enough to feed his family. But a rare disease to his horse Glanders affected his livelihood badly. After wandering for days in search of work, he now works as a laborer, hardly managing to garner two[Read More…]
Why are the people of so rightly called third world countries still falling in tarp of deceitful, shrewd,and criminal, politicians, sold-out, hate-mongering, unethical media houses and journalists? Common people understand, and experience, both in theory and in practice, that most of the politicians irrespective of their party affiliations are demagogues, merciless looters, potential murderers, and rapists with no real[Read More…]
Co-Wriiten by Ila Kazmi & Arpita Singh Days after a devastating fire broke out in an illegal shoe factory – which killed 4 workers among two minors- in Raj Park Sultanpuri, nothing has changed on the ground as unauthorized factories in the residential area continue to operate. One can find dilapidated buildings from where these illegal small-scale factories operate, raising questions[Read More…]
Privatisation of many sectors has become a routine affair. Construction of roads, supply of electricity, means of transportation, etc have been handed over to contractors, firms, private individuals for maintaining and development. Recently, there has been a proposal to hand over ‘ Red Fort’ to Dalmia Bharat to upkeep and improve facilities as part of ‘ Adopt a Heritage ‘[Read More…]
On coming 10 May is the 161th anniversary of 1857 – the country’s First War of Independence. 10th May 1857 is the day when the brave Indian soldiers first raised the war-cry for independence against the British regime. To secure freedom for the country by breaking the chains of slavery, on 10th May the soldiers started from Meerut, reaching Delhi[Read More…]
Recent unrest broke out at Aligarh Muslim University is nothing but the sheer display of impunity granted to right-wing vigilante groups by none other than ruling dispensation of BJP/RSS, both in the state of Uttar Pradesh and at the centre. Since the advent of this government, the activities of vigilante Hindutva outfits like Hindu Yuva Vahini and likens have been[Read More…]
Interacting with media during a tour of Lingayat and Dalit mutts in central Karnataka, Amit Shah, the national President of BJP began making allegations against the current Siddaramaiah government. “ Recently, a Supreme Court judge said if ever there was a competition for the most corrupt government, then Yeddyurappa government will get number one..” shocking Yedurappa who was seated near[Read More…]
Now that the Rajya Sabha Chairman Venkaiah Naidu has dismissed the proposal submitted by some seventy -odd Opposition legislators to impeach Supreme Court Chief Justice Dipak Misra, the debate over the issue has to be extended beyond the legalese of the arguments in which our eminent jurists had been indulging all these months, into the arena of commonsense arguments where[Read More…]
A group of over 100 journalists and other professionals related to online media today wrote to the Information & Broadcasting minister Smriti Irani to express their concerns over the ministry’s proposal to extend traditional broadcasting rules and restrictions to the Internet. The journalists include both veterans of the industry like Raghav Bahl, MK Venu, Madhu Trehan, Nalini Singh, Paranjoy Guha[Read More…]
The CAG’s reporttabled in Delhi Legislative Assembly on April 3 has thrown a volley of harsh questions at the ruling AamAdmi Party. The report has highlighted the stark corruption prevalent in the National Capital’s public distribution system (PDS). PDS has been grappling with innumerable problems including faulty Adhaar linkages and failure in verification of biometric data. The National Food[Read More…]
JOHAR TISS/ ADIVASI STUDENTS’ FORUM’S (ASF) STATEMENT TATA INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL SCIENCES 67th Day of STRIKE Our Struggle Continues… The results for the various M.A. programs at Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) for 2018-2020 batch was declared yesterday (27th April 2018), and with it the institute has made it very clear to discontinue its policy of adjusting the Hostel[Read More…]
Modi’s biggest contribution to India is teaching it to hate. It seems to be finally dawning on the people that “Modistan” is the same as “Rogistan”. As the BJP wins election after election to now rule 21 states in India, victory galas and revelry should swamp party cadres. Instead, what have the BJP and its Sangh ideologues ushered in? The[Read More…]
Potentially a game changing digital technology, the use of crypto-currencies like Bitcoin as a viable alternative to the national currencies like Dollar or Rupee, has largely been seen by countries across the world –with India being no exception- as a danger to the existing government-centralized economic system. With contention over use of crypto-currencies as a medium of exchange, Finance Minister[Read More…]
Forgetting the relationship between education and society and ignoring the required engagement between thinker theorists and innovators on one side and society on the other, the governments, legislators and people hypnotized by the neoliberal economy have came to an understanding that commericialisation/marketisation of education from first grade to PhD is the best way forward not for any appreciable societal transformations[Read More…]
Some self-styled Indian patriots settled in UK have launched a petition seeking action against those who tore the Indian national flag recently. The incident happened during protests against visiting Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The protests were mainly organized by groups representing religious minorities in India that feel threatened under the right wing Hindu nationalist Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) government[Read More…]
He had forbidden us to call him ‘Justice Sachar’. So I began to call him Sachar Saheb. Four days after his death, I sit down to write this tribute. The personality of Sachar Saheb was like a masterpiece, epic in its dimensions. A classic personality in this absurd period! In a tribute like this, written for the media, there is[Read More…]
Venkadarath Saritha, a 30-year-old contractual bus driver with Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) has not taken a day off from her work from last three months – not even on Sundays. She drives a bus for eight hours daily and repercussions of not turning up on duty include a cut from her already meager salary. Saritha is among 12,000 contractual employees[Read More…]
The busting of the Hindutva racket who tried to foment communal tension in Kerala in the name of the ‘People’s Hartal’ on 16th of this month has sent shock waves through Kerala society. The hartal was called through Whatsapp groups to protest the gruesome rape and murder of the Kathua minor girl. Since the sponsors remained anonymous, no organisation claimed[Read More…]
Dr Kafeel Khan who managed to save the lives of a number of children in the last August’s Gorakhpur hopital tragedy where 63 children died within a span of five days for a lack of supply of oxygen cylinders has written a heart rending letter from jail, where he is lodged without bail for the last seven months. In the[Read More…]
The exchange of banters between the outgoing veteran Congress MP Renuka Chaudhury and India’s Vice-President Venkaiah Naidu in the Rajya Sabha, during the ceremony to bid farewell to her and other retiring MPs , has taken an ugly turn. In her farewell speech Renuka Chaudhury while addressing Naidu (who is also the Rajya Sabha Chairman), in a self-deprecating humorous vein [Read More…]
A black week for our venerated democratic institutions got a tad darker on Friday. In a whirlwind 5 days we have witnessed acquittals of murder convicts, votives of militant hate and architects of massacre. With the second ever impeachment motion against a Supreme Court Judge, no less the Chief Justice himself (first ever), the country stands at a precipice, an[Read More…]
The social ferment presently being witnessed all over India and abroad, where the Indian diaspora has spread out, is the background in which Modi has set out on his latest whistle-stop tours abroad.The month of April has been very restive, with country-wide Bandh call on 2nd April by the Dalits who constitute about 17% of India’s population. This was followed[Read More…]
The recent UGC move to grant autonomous status to 62 educational institutions have been hailed in various quarters. MHRD has praised it and have equated the move to grant autonomous status to Universities with “New economic policies of 1991”. The new move has been[Read More…]
Through the title I don’t want to shed a sense of pessimism about the future of Jawaharlal Nehru University, instead my attempt is to lay bare the context which is indeed very frustrating and demotivating. Also, being in the campus from the last two year it seemed to me that somewhere down the line a crisis is also emanating from[Read More…]
People’s Tribunal on Attack on Educational Institutions was held at the Constitution Club of India, New Delhi, on April 11-13, 2018. The tribunal was organised by the People’s Commission on Shrinking Democratic Space in India (PCSDS). The jury panel of the tribunal comprisedJustice (Retd.) Hosbet Suresh, Justice (Retd.) B.G. Kolse Patil, Prof. Amit Bhaduri, Dr. Uma Chakravarty, Prof. T.K. Oommen,[Read More…]
The Challenge is to rise above this hatred and divisiveness and create a new narrative of courage, beauty of diverse life and love. It seems that we as a nation, in India, are experiencing a free fall to some unimaginable abyss. Every day brings news of ever more grisly, convoluted crimes planned not by some petty dirty criminals, but far[Read More…]
When hate invades the human mind, there is no limit to brutal atrocity. On April 10, a Guardian story showed a video in which there is cheering as an Israeli sniper shoots an unarmed Palestinian a considerable distance away. Shown on TV in Israel, it has been the subject of some introspective debate. Then there is news from Kashmir to[Read More…]
Even the establishment media ultimately could not underplay the Farmers’ March from Nasik to Mumbai in March 2018. And not long ago we saw the Farmers’ Strike in Maharashtra; that happened in June 2017. All the pictures those protests presented showed a queer image of Maharashtra, a state which is set to be a Trillion $ economy by 2025 [[1]][Read More…]
So, this summer as the sun blazes all over,there will be scorching political heat as well.The much awaited poll bugle in Karnataka has been blown and preparations for the showdown are on. We will be witnessing an intensely fought poll battle in the recent times.Political parties are in full swing to prepare the ground and this battle of throne[Read More…]
In the face of increasing attacks on democratic space including higher education institutions, students’ bodies, teachers and civil rights activists, a number of civil society organisations have come together to form PCSDS. This Commission is holding its first people’s tribunal on attack on educational institutions from 11th April to 13th April where over 120 testimonies of students and professors will[Read More…]
The Fifteenth Finance Commission’s (FFC) Terms of Reference (ToR) have generated a lot of criticism across a wide spectrum of thinking, especially among the South Indian states. The States which have already been affected with the winding up of the Planning Commission, as well as with the introduction of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime, are up in[Read More…]
Mid-day Meal Workers in Assam are up in arms against the privatisation of the mid-day meals scheme for schools in the State and demanding better pay As we went up the narrow steps to the CITU (Centre of Indian Trade Union) office in Chandmari in Guwahati, we were ushered into a room with no natural light, and could vaguely make[Read More…]
Ever since the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led regime took charge of Jawaharlal Nehru University by appointing M. Jagadesh Kumar as its new vice-chancellor, it has demonized this prestigious university as a “den of anti-nationals”. Other Hindutva blows included attempts to dismantle its secular and progressive character, accelerate the already ongoing privatization and scuttle the already shrinking democratic and dissenting spaces. Moreover,[Read More…]
It was with a combination of dismay, delight and amusement that I watched the following two minute spoof because in an offhand way, it reminded of my own government’s lies (and for which many naive voters fall every time that there is going to be a new election for particular government offices). After watching the spoof, I imagined my own[Read More…]
Students of Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai have demonstrated an unprecedented protest in the history of their institute campuses at Mumbai, Guwahati, Tuljapur and Hyderabad. TISS is a deemed to be university as per University Act 1954 (3 of 1956) No. F,1122/62U2 fully funded by University Grants Commission (UGC) /Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD), Government of India[Read More…]
Protests that swept north India have cost five lives today as Dalit groups tried to enforce an all-India shutdown over a Supreme Court order. In Madhya Pradesh, four people died during clashes and a man was killed in firing in Rajasthan’s Alwat. Violence was also reported from parts of Punjab, Rajasthan, Jharkhand, and Uttar Pradesh. Punjab came to a standstill[Read More…]
In recent days, South Indian leaders including Karnataka CM, K Siddaramiah and Andhra Pradesh CM, Chandrababu Naidu (others include DMK working president MK Stalin, Jana Sena Leader Pawan Kalyan) have spoken in one voice against the 15th Finance Commission — arguing that it is unfair to South Indian states. The bone of contention is a directive, in the terms of reference, given to the Finance[Read More…]
The present Indian state is treating JNU as an occupied territory. State-sponsored violence and molestation against the students call for a #metoo moment against the state. Co-Written by Amrita Datta and Arani Basu A piece of land with people – young and old, vibrant, thinking beings. Police posts in and around the land. Random police raids of homes of these[Read More…]
Co-Written by Amit Kumar & Skand Priya Ever since the MHRD made its intentions clear to grant autonomous status to institutions of higher education as a result of which 60 institutions have already been granted autonomy including 5 central universities and 21 state universities, teachers’ movement at University of Delhi has become extremely charged and committed in its fight to[Read More…]
(Even though digitisation of various services has helped a lot yet it has adversely affected personal privacy) The Facebook/Analytica scam has shaken the digital world. There are allegations about the use of personal data during last US elections. According to the expose the information about people is being collected, stored and processed to produce psychographic profiles that can judge peoples’[Read More…]
“In general, the rural moneylender as a species has proved surprisingly resilient, even in countries such as India and Indonesia where it has been a declared objective of state intervention in financial markets to suppress him.” — Hulme and Mosley, Finance Against Poverty A sense of deep despair runs through the lives of farmers in India. They have lost[Read More…]
Fake news is a sort of propaganda intended to mislead the audience; a kind of yellow journalism. Propaganda or fake news is not a new thing in the digital age. Power struggle between Octavian and Anthony wasaccompanied with the propaganda; Maulavi Muhammad Baqar was martyred for his spirited struggle against the British propaganda. Even, peeping in tothe religious echelons, we[Read More…]
When it comes to plundering of public spaces for the benefit the builder lobby, there is not much to choose in Mahrashtra between the Shiv Sena-BJP combine or the Congress parties. In the year 2005 during the Congress rule, Ganesh Naik, environment and forest minister, openly talked of the need to sell public spaces. That these were very scarce in[Read More…]
Muslims are second largest religious community after Hindus in India,accounting about fifteen percent of the total population. As a Muslim community they are second only to Indonesia. They are present in every region of India, in thestate of Jammu and Kashmir, West Bengal, Asam and in Kerala they are substantial in number. But when viewed as per representation in different[Read More…]
The students of the public school systems in India are lagging massively behind in terms of learning outcomes according to the National Achievement Survey (NAS), conducted by National Council for Education and Research (NCERT). The numbers are especially stark in Mathematics with national averages of 64%, 54% and 42% at Class 3rd, 5th and 8th levels according to an Indian[Read More…]
Data is being acquired without much thought as to its security or end-use. Take for instance, the National Cadet Corps (NCC) collecting the names, mobile numbers and e-mail IDs of 1.3 million young boys and girls so that the PM can interact with them via the Narendra Modi App. [“For chat with PM Modi, NCC collects mobile, email IDs of[Read More…]
The country’s largest bank, the State Bank of India (SBI), has closed as many as 41.16 lakh savings accounts between April-January in the current fiscal year for not maintaining the minimum balance, reveals an RTI query. Between April and November 2017, the bank had netted a windfall of Rs 1,771.67 crore, more than its second-quarter profit, from customers for non-maintenance[Read More…]
Police brutally attacked a peaceful march dubbed as “Long March” organised by JNU Teachers’ Association and the JNU Students’ Union near INA market New Delhi yesterday. Many students were injured. The police detained 23 students. The protest was organised against various issues inside the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) including privatisation of education, scuttling of reservation and demanding suspension of Professor[Read More…]
This 23rd March (2018) is the 86th anniversary of the martyrdom of three great revolutionaries, Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukhdev. They were hanged for the crime to overthrow the alien British rule in India. The colonial rulers like elsewhere thought that with the physical elimination of these freedom fighters their ideas and dreams of a democratic-secular and egalitarian independent India[Read More…]
The martyrdom of Bhagat Sing, Rajguru and Sukhdev on March 23, 1931is great milestone in the glorious history of India’s freedom struggle against the colonial rule. These contemporary documents show how Periyar, Dr. Ambedkar and even Jinnah supported the struggle of these revolutionaries. It is to be noted that the Hindutva gang ruling India today which claims to be the[Read More…]
The Akhil Bharatiya Hindu Mahasabha, a right wing Hindu nationalist political party in the Northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, released a Hindu New Year calendar which says that Taj Mahal along with several mosques and monuments from the Mughal era, are “Hindu Temples,” Times of India reported Monday (March 19). The calendar refers to Taj Mahal as “Tejo[Read More…]
Elections are the festival of democracies and the same holds true for India, the world’s largest democracy. Indians, after achieving independence from the British colonialism, have been exercising their voting rights to choose their representatives through the means of elections, held at regular intervals. The period of emergency from 1975 to 1977 being the only exception to this much-extolled fact[Read More…]
Ensuring Citizen Safety through Law Enforcement and thereby ending Everyday Violence is a Prerequisite to End Poverty in India Violence in society at macro level is manifested in multiple forms such as genocide, wars, ethnic cleansing, attacks prompted by religious bigotry, and heinous acts of terrorism.Some thinkers include state led violence against civil resistance also in this category. Such[Read More…]
Second of three interviews from the cradle of the revolutionary uprising Aneek, an independent, radical Baanglaa monthly from Kolkata, India, in its 53rd years of publication, interviewed three leaders of the Naxalbari Uprising. The leaders with working class background were organizing armed struggle of the poor-landless peasantry in the Naxalbari region since the earliest days of the revolutionary initiative. Following[Read More…]
Memorandum submitted to union commerce minister and agriculture minister To Shri. Suresh Prabhu Honorable Minister for Commerce and Industry Udyog Bhavan, New Delhi 11017, India Sir, Sub : An appeal to take forward the WTO negotiations on fisheries This is in relation to multi-ministerial meeting in New Delhi on the 19th and 20th of March, 2018 by the Ministry of[Read More…]
In 1919 Charles Ponzi, a clerk in Boston, suckered Americans with a scheme that is now identified with his name. At a time when interest rates stood at 5 percent, Ponzi offered investors a 50 percent return in just 45 days. The pitch was to buy postal coupons—used for buying foreign stamps, in a particular country, and then capitalize[Read More…]
99 Smart Cities, and an investment of Rs. 1,91,155 of which 80% funds are being spent on a mere 9% population of a city in the Area BAsed Development component of the project. Housing for all by 2022 of which foundation lies in concept of slum free city. Is this how we are heading towards an inclusive, participative and[Read More…]
Delhi (15 March): Today people from 14 states testified about their situation of hunger and unemployment in a national public hearing at the Gandhi Peace Foundation, organised by the Right to Food Campaign. These testimonies were heard by a panel comprising of activists, journalists, lawyers, legislators, scholars and trade union leaders. Denial of ration to eligible households The hearing began[Read More…]
The day before the 90th Academy Awards, a friend from the academia called me with a suggestion. He was adamant. “You know that the Churchill Movie will win some awards and you should have an article ready to publish before the announcement,” he admonished. I agreed but failed to produce it in time. Strangely enough, I wrote a lot in[Read More…]
Does a career in the Indian civil service mean a life of ‘public service’? It is a puzzling question given the sloth and the thickets of red-tapism that have eroded the bureaucracy. Moreover, the way events have been unfolding, most will tend to agree that all it means is a lifetime of serving the most despicable lot of politicians[Read More…]
The spectacular red flag , disciplined march of farmers spearheaded by the kisan wing of the Communist party of India (M), and other Left organizations in Maharashtra has galvanized public opinion. The week-long march which reached Mumbai on March 12 is a great morale booster for the Left. The images of sore feet of women and men trudging nearly 180[Read More…]
A farmers’ march in India has triumphed, for now. Countercurrents (Countercurrents.org), an e-journal from southern India, headlines on March 12, 2018: “Historic Victory for Farmers of Maharashtra”. The victory is in Mumbai, India’s financial-heart, hundreds of kilometers west of Tripura, an industrially less-developed state, where, only days ago, Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI-M) experienced massive rightist assault, and, rightists,[Read More…]
We, the Adivasi Students at Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai strongly reject the Plan of Action for GoI-PMS students (dated – 3rd March 2018) and (dated – 10th March 2018). According to the proposal under Section IV: Admission for the academic year 2018-2019 of (1) ST/SC Students eligible for GoI-PMS for Masters Programme – the eligible SC/ST students have[Read More…]
New Delhi / Mumbai March 12: Seven days after the Kisan Long March of 50,000 small and marginal farmers have finally resulted in a positive outcome with Maharashtra government accepting all the demands raised by All India Kisan Sabha. National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM) congratulates the struggle of the farmers and adivasis and hopes that the Fadnavis government will[Read More…]
The farmers in Maharashtra won a historic victory after 50,000 farmers threatened to siege the state assembly. The Devendra Fadnavis government of Maharashtra has agreed to the demands of protesting farmers. A committee has been set up, which will consider all aspects of their demands, which includes loan waiver, free electricity and a higher price for their produce.The government has[Read More…]
A new chief minister has sworn in Tripura. Obviously, BJP also played the same politics by selecting the Bengali immigrant as chief minister of the state as the CPM has been doing. In the din of despicable and condemnable attack on Lenin’s statue, the larger issues that these results have thrown have been ignored deliberately. Normally, the elections in the[Read More…]
The past few days have been crazy for statues all across the country. I even saw one sweating with worry over his fate the day the Saffrons and the Reds clashed on the streets of Kolkata. I told him he was safe given Didi’s quick dispersal of police squads, who faced the odd predicament of manning blocks of stone over[Read More…]
A historic ralley of over 35,000 farmers which started from Nashik district will surround the Maharashtra Assembly tomorrow demanding loan waivers and other just demands. They walked about 180 km over the last five days. They entered Mumbai, the capital of Maharashtra today and are camping at KJ Somaiya Ground in Sion. The farmer contingent, including tribal cultivators, led by[Read More…]
Do not provoke them to another Muthanga; Do not commit them as cannon fodder to the Maoists. In the light of the cries of agony from the tribal hamlets of Kerala, the last instance of which is the brutal murder of Madhu, the hungry forest dweller of Attappadi, in the Palaghat district of Kerala that has shocked mainstream sensibilities, civil[Read More…]
As the vandalisation of the statues of the Great Indian leaders continue the integration of the soul of India is under threat. PM has strongly condemned and warned against such low acts and all true Indians fail to understand why is this happening?. This is really un understandable that Indian society has still not learnt to respect its leaders; whatsoever[Read More…]
How Billionaires Celebrate Naxalbari@50(And some other sides of the Half Truth they showed) A bare bodied mason, whose name was given as some Murmu, stood outside Kanu Sanyal’s home, “a single room hut thatched with corrugated tin… in a dilapidated condition… portion of the roof has cracked; sun-rays light up the room where his books, notepads and clothes lay in[Read More…]
India produces enough food to meet the needs of its entire population yet, it is unable to feed millions of them, especially women and children. India ranks 100th among 119 countries in the Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2017, where it has consistently ranked poorly. Despite the fact that every twelfth Indian has to sleep on an empty stomach, the[Read More…]
The reprehensible acts by the Tripura Hindutva goons of razing statues of Lenin who led the greatest October Socialist Revolution in 1917 and was the only head of a state (USSR) who supported the Indian freedom struggle, should not surprise anybody. Large number of revolutionaries like Bhagat Singh, Rajguru, Sukhdev, Chandershekhar Azad, Ashfaqullah adopted socialism as their creed and died[Read More…]
This beats even Hema Malini’s absurd observation in the wake of the fire in the Kamala mill compound in Mumbai last December in which 14 people mainly from affluent families were killed. She blamed it on the influx of people from outside for the city’s problems. That was bad enough for a BJP MP and popular film actor. But at[Read More…]
The saffron forces find their foothold in North-eastern states in recent elections to Tripura, Nagaland and Meghalaya. This new found sense of power pushes them towards acts of vandalism of statues. It starts with Lenin in Tripura. This is later followed by Periyar Rama Swamy in Tamilnadu and Ambedkar in Uttar Pradesh. There can be no doubt that ideological differences[Read More…]
The right wing Sangh Parivar elements are on a statue destroying spree in India. Just hours after Lenin’s statue was toppled in Tripura after BJP’s historic victory there, statue of Dravidian icon and social reformer EVR Ramasamy, popularly known as Periyar was vandalised in Tamil Nadu. The vandalisation came after a top BJP national secretary H Raja posted on Facebook[Read More…]
Tripura, an eastern-India state, is experiencing post-election violence, which is completely a rightist onslaught on its opposition political activists, the progressives. The onslaught has not spared a statue, a statue of Lenin; and thus it has confirmed the onslaught’s political character: extreme rightist; and extreme right is extreme anti-working classes; and working classes are the biggest segment of people. Thus,[Read More…]
Tripura elections results have come and the obituaries of left in general and the CPI (M) in particular are being written. BJP, in alliance with a secessionist outfit IPFT is going to form the next government in the state. BJP has, apart from other factors, utilized massive deployment of money and other resources to influence the elections. The BJP[Read More…]
Lynching of Madhu in Attappadi shocked the conscience of Indian society. #ApologyMadhu hashtags went viral on social media. We have to go beyond hashtags and look for the real reasons why Madhu was murdered for allegedly stealing some rice and chilly powder. It is two decades since the Aadivaasi in Kerala lost his right to self-rule. It is time to[Read More…]
The BJP and its ally – the Indigenous People’s Front of Tripura (IPFT) – have won the 2018 elections to the Tripura state legislature. The alliance of the BJP and the IPFT will now form a government. The Left It is the first time in twenty-five years that Tripura, a state of four million people in India’s northeast, will be[Read More…]
A popular adage claims that the history of the world would have taken a different discourse had it been penned down by women, tribals, blacks and the colonised. Over a period of time after plethora of initiatives and struggle by various academicians, activists and the interested section of the society, there has been a substantial space created, though inviting ire[Read More…]
Dr. Ambedkar Society, SOAS, condemns the casteist onslaught on Dalit, Adivasi and OBC students of Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) campuses across India by denying them access to Post Matric Scholarship. We stand in solidarity with TISS students who have been resisting this systematic stripping of their rights since last year. The protest has intensified in the last[Read More…]
The world’s great philanthropist and investment leader, Warren Buffett, once said, “It’s only when the tide goes out that you realise who has been swimming naked”. Well, it’s the ebb of the tide for many of India’s high-flying crony capitalists like Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi, as they find themselves caught in an ignominious buff. Their diamonds may have sparkled[Read More…]
Since February 21, 2018 students at Tata Institute of Social Sciences, India (TISS) have been striking against the changes in the Government of India–Post Matric Scholarship (GoI-PMS), which leads to the withdrawal of scholarship of students belonging to Scheduled Castes (SC), Scheduled Tribes (ST) and Other Backward Classes (OBCs). Despite regular threats by the TISS administration, students belonging to different[Read More…]
Trafficking[1] of humans for the purpose of forced labor or commercial sexual exploitation is an organized crime. Currently, India does not have a comprehensive and strong anti-human-trafficking law. As a result, the Indian police sometimes depends onImmoral Traffic Prevention Act, sometimes Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act and some other times a few existing labor lawsto deal with the[Read More…]
India is home to one-fifth of the world’s population which includes a third of the world’s poor and one-eighth of the world’s elderly. Several million of them who spend their whole lives as informal workers have no retirement security other than the hope that their children will care for them in their old age. This arrangement worked well as[Read More…]
The Aligarh Muslim University’s administration is busy preparing the ground to grandly welcome the President of India Shri Ramnath Kovind as the Chief Guest of the 65th convocation of the university to be held on 7th March. AMU will be dressed in a bridal gown and tiny lights all over the corner will add charm. The University Road which[Read More…]
Today in Delhi there was a demonstration call given by BAPSA at Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment in support of TISS Students. While the protesting students were detained at Parliament Street Police Station for no reason as such (some were injured, roughed up), but thankfully the police incharge at the end allowed (and helped) us to meet the ministry.[Read More…]
To The Minister of Social Justice and Empowerment Government of India Shastri Bhawan, C-Wing, Dr. Rajendra Prasad Road New Delhi – 110 011 February 28, 2018 REGARDING DEMANDS OF STUDENTS OF TATA INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL SCIENCES Dear Madam/Sir, We, the students of Tata Institute of Social Sciences writing this to seek your urgent attention to the protests going on since[Read More…]
One can understand the BJP suppressing the involvement of its drunken leader in the killing of nine school children and injuring 20 other children in broad daylight in Bihar last week. But why did a large section of the media join in suppressing the news while it gave saturation coverage to the death of film star Sridevi ?. We are[Read More…]
A Solidarity Statement signed by more than 150 persons including activists, academicians, TISS-alumni, scholars, intellectuals, journalist, writers, teachers, lawyers, artists, filmmakers, students, researchers, professionals and others concerned citizens has supported the students movements and their rightful demands in all the four campuses of TISS. Radhika Vemula, the mother of former Hyderabad Central University scholar Rohith Vemula – who was institutionally[Read More…]
When I joined Tata Institute of Social Sciences (hereon TISS) in 2014 to pursue Masters in Development Policy, Planning and Practice from its Tuljapur campus, one thing which struck me was the considerable number of students coming from lower class and caste background or from other marginalized communities unlike many other ‘elite’ social sciences Institutions in India. As I hailed[Read More…]
The Uttar Pradesh (UP) state government of Yogi Adityanath continued allowing police encounters since BJP came to power in the state in March 2017, Caravan News of India reported Monday (Feb. 26, 2018). In 10 months of its regime, the state police conducted 1038 encounters killing 32 alleged criminals, and the Yogi government has officially boasted of these killings.[Read More…]
Pity the rich, wrote American popular comedian Will Durst recently in a satirical vein. They face too many problems. No body robs the poor but the rich are always afraid of robbers. But actually the rich rob the poor. He then went on to refer to the rich as open cancer sores on the face of society. One was reminded[Read More…]
Microfinance continues to thrive despite being under fire from legions of critics. One plausible reason for the lingering faith in the power of microfinance is that it provides a convenient strategy for investors to demonstrate that they are active fighters against poverty and are trying to save the poor while making a substantial amount of money from them. It is built[Read More…]
Amid cacophonies of blowing horns and revving engines of lumbering trucks on the national highways 37 and 31 and the deafening whistles of diesel locomotives across the state, one could easily hear the hues and cries of the most Bengali speaking people in Assam.For them the new year began with utter suspense as millions of Assamese woke up to a[Read More…]
If the representative you vote for is on the basis of his or her financial strength, then do not worry. You deserve a corrupt government – a government which will loot all your rights. Many honest and sincere candidates have been elected in this country in the past history. However, there is a drastic decline in the ratio of[Read More…]
It has been three days the students at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) and its various campuses located in different parts of the country are boycotting their classes as part of a larger protest. In Hyderabad, one of the off-centres of TISS, I have been witnessing this as the culmination of accumulated anger and frustration of the students.[Read More…]
0. Preface: Main thrust of this paper lies in justification of Proportional Representation (PR) for all segments of the society at all levels in all spheres of power on the basis of definition of democracy. In the political arena this (PR) can be achieved with the help of list-Proportional-Representation (list-PR) system of election. Initially the suggested changes will need to[Read More…]
Otherwise, it seems improbable that Prime Minister Narendra Modi known for his penchant for photogenic tele-shoots with visiting foreign dignitaries should miss the opportunity offered by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on a week-long visit to India from February 17 (2018). On his first visit to India, Mr Trudeau was received in the country by a junior agriculture minister.[Read More…]
Heartiest Congratulations to the Govt of India. They have allowed the second billionaire who has done the biggest fraud of India to leave the country. Where are those who are charged with the responsibility of keeping an eye on the financial institutions in the country, like the revenue intelligence wings in Banks, RBI, ED and others? Why the Government[Read More…]
[This article is in response to the essay, ‘Don’t Foist Fear Onto Nationalism’, by C.K Saji Narayan published in Outlook’s Republic Day special issue.] The ideologues of the RSS clan are working overtime to create a narrative of latter’s participation in India’s anti-colonial freedom struggle. This project got impetus after the electoral victory in 2014 of RSS/BJP which was celebrated[Read More…]
Despite four years of the RSS (via its pocket organization BJP) rule in India under the leadership of PM Modi, a hardened practitioner of the Hindutva politics, the RSS dream of converting democratic-secular polity of India into Hindu rashtra where Manusmriti would be law of the land seems to have fizzled out. The RSS had declared the enthronement of Modi[Read More…]
The Rastriya Swayamsevak Sangh’s chief Mr.Mohan Bhagwat says that the RSS as a military network (of the Brahminic forces) can move to the borders to protect the nation within three days while the Indian Army ( multicultural, multi-caste and secular force) will take six months. This is not only dangerous statement of the ISIS kind, but it has serious life[Read More…]
Any claim of justice is incomplete, unless it doesn’t reconcile the dimension of recognition and redistribution. Dalit and left politics need to grasp this broader zone of injustice which is constitutive of both cultural misrecognition and economic exploitation. 2014 general election was an important juncture in the life of Indian democracy for the following reasons- no one had imagined that[Read More…]
German playwright and author Bertolt Brecht wrote “The Radio as an Apparatus of Communication. Radio is one sided when it should be two. It is purely an apparatus for distribution, for mere sharing out. So, here is a positive suggestion: change this apparatus over from distribution to communication. The radio would be the finest possible communication apparatus in public life,[Read More…]
New Delhi, February 8, 2018: Calling this year’s union budget ‘just an exercise in manipulation of numbers,’ veteran activist Medha Patkar asked, “When the major decisions like the demonetisation and GST are taken between two budgets then what’s the relevance of the Budget?,” at a panel discussion on the analysis of this year’s union budget with a special focus on[Read More…]
Most people have a psychological aversion to repaying bank loans. In several cases, they have sufficient assets and capital to redeem their debt but they use every possible means to avoid it. Things have turned so bad that whether it is an individual or institution, getting back any money at all is a reason for celebration. We have seen[Read More…]
Our constitution entitles every citizen, of this great democracy, with meticulously detailed rights which forms the broad strokes that enables one to enjoy the nuances of the method of democracy. As time evolves the broad spectrum offered by these rights starts to branch out into multiple rights of their own drawing existence from the predecessor. One such right is the[Read More…]
PM Modi’s speeches in both the Houses of Indian Parliament on February 7, 2017 while defending Motion of Thanks on President Ram Nath Kovind’s address belied hope which some political analystscarried that Modi after becoming PM would mature and overcome Hindutva traits of double-speak, rabble rousing and resort to lies which he learnt in the RSS shakhas. While replying he[Read More…]
Among the political galleries of India there have been discussions about holding simultaneous elections for the state assemblies and the Lok Sabha every five years. The momentum for this ambitious proposal was generated by the ruling Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) and the Prime Minister himself. Last year, Mr Narendra modi while unveiling his “15 year vision document for new India”[Read More…]
Why did senior retired bureaucrats and Veterans of the Armed Forces together organize a Conclave in Delhi on October 10, 2017, on “A Fractured Polity – the Relevance of Gandhi Today “, and another on “Hinduism and Hindutva” on January 30, 2018, Gandhiji’s death anniversary? Why did they write Open Letters in the last few months raising concerns about the[Read More…]
Social activists, writers, film makers, academicians and members of the civil society have condemned the police brutality unleashed by the Kerala Police against the Dalit Atmabhiman Convention organized by the Dalit Bhoo Avakasha Samara Munnani (Dalit Land Rights’ Organisation) in Vadayampadi, Kochi on 4th February. Prominent signatories include Aruna Roy, Prafulla Samanthra, Kavitha Srivasthava, Teesta Setalvad, K. Sachithanandan, Paul Zakharia,[Read More…]
As the alternate media expands its reaches to hundred thousand Indians across the country, thanks to increasingly cheaper internet connectivity, its restraint and liability also start surfacing in public discourses. The limitation and gradually losing credibility of the mainstream media may pave the way for a boosting alternate media, but it is still miles apart from the trustworthiness among[Read More…]
The South Asian activists gathered at Holland Park in Surrey on Sunday evening to remember Gauri Lankesh and Rohith Vemula, the two prominent victims of the right wing extremists. Organized by the Indians Abroad for Pluralist India (IAPI), the rally was held to mark the birth anniversaries of the two individuals who stood up against the violence of Hindutva forces.[Read More…]
In its recent press release the NREGA Sangrash Morcha brought in several important issues which we need to reflect upon for the efficient implementation of one of the world’s biggest employment guarantee schemes. The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) budget for 2018-19 is Rs 55,000 crores, the same as that of this year’s in money terms. (The[Read More…]
The ‘insider-outsider’ problematic of diaspora gives every Malayali’s life a degree of tension and uncertainty today. For the six million remittance-dependent population of Kerala, no news from the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries is comforting. Of late, the distress signals from countries like Saudi Arabia, Oman, Kuwait etc are too many. So are their implications for Kerala. The major documents[Read More…]
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley just gave away his fifth and final Budget speech at the parliament this thursday. This budget, for the country and the BJP led NDA government, has remained to act a crucial one. Couple of factors determines this – Firstly, its the first budget that the country is witnessing after having one of its major economic move[Read More…]
India has long been a testing ground for several western products, particularly in agriculture and medicine—making the most of loose regulations and genetic diversity of a huge population. It is done to help cut research costs dramatically for lucrative products to be sold in the West. The relationship is highly exploitative and many believe it represents a new colonialism.[Read More…]
What about the stigmatized profession of sex work is? Is it the effect of work of past life as per ‘Karma Theory’(theory of Work) of ‘Vedas’ and ‘Purnanas’? According to the Indian thought, we nurture the theory of ‘karma’(work) which is the result of past life or earlier past of the life. The Karma theory stands for the law of[Read More…]
In today’s world, where almost everything is a click away for many, access to healthcare, descents into alcoholism, and misperceptions about illnesses can still take us back to the eighteenth century. In this brief article, the idea is to give an overview of the interplay between the aforementioned determinants while presenting some evidence from the ground. The World Health Organization[Read More…]
The average, declared, moveable and immovable assets of the 70 Union Cabinet members is around Rs 16 crores. The Union Budget 2018-2019 is Rs 1866418 crores after subtracting the 23% that will go on interest payments on borrowings (at interest rates and repayment terms set by the Government itself). Assuming this average per cabinet minister extends to all politicians[Read More…]
While the 2018 -19 has disappointed many and satisfied few: among those who were left dismayed are persons with disabilities. The PM named them ‘ Divyaang’ but not much has been done to uplift them socially and financially. The Nation Platform for the Rights of the Disabled persons ( NPRD) has issued a statement expressing concerns. The finance minister[Read More…]
New Delhi / Mumbai, February 2, 2018: The Budget speech of Finance Minister Arun Jaitley kept harping on the fact that, the key focus of the government was farmers, rural poor, marginal communities and SC/ST, however, the overall announcements and allocations completely fell short of the intentions. The announcement of the celebration of 150 years of Gandhi is welcome but[Read More…]
The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) budget for 2018-19 is Rs 55,000 crores, the same as that of this year’s in money terms. (The initial budget of Rs 48,000 crores for 2017-18 was supplemented with Rs 7,000 crores in January 2018). Also, given the trend of rising pending liabilities at the end of every year, a sizable part of[Read More…]
Despite the coming to power of a ‘Nationalist’ government, India continues to be full of anti-nationals. Government is so much struggling to build nationalism, but to little effect. Anti-nationals are everywhere. But there is nothing to worry for the nationalist government. They have a new solution at their hands in the form of ‘Nationalism Glasses’. CCTV recently came out with[Read More…]
(Former Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Ramdas filed a petition in the Supreme Court on January 30, 2018 asking the Suprme Court to investigate the death of Judge Loya and the curcumstances around it. Here’s a testimony on the circumstances behind his action) To Whom It May Concern So Why Am I filing a Writ Petition and PIL on the[Read More…]
THE HINDUTVA GANG CONTINUES TO CELEBRATE ‘VADH’/MURDER OF GANDHI In last 4-5- years a concerted campaign is on to spread confusion about the identity of the conspirators/killers of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, also known as Father of the Nation. He was assassinated on January 30, 1948 at Delhi. After prolong hearings Nathuram Godse and Narayan Apte were sentenced to death and[Read More…]
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhiwas born before 148 years ago on October 2, 1869. The young Gandhi grew to manhood in the state of Gujarat, where the impact of the West was more remote than in the administrative centres of British imperialism at Bombay, Calcutta and Madras. The saints and values of devotional Hinduism shaped his consciousness and reinforced his adoption of[Read More…]
We of the sinking middle class may sink without further struggles into the working class where we belong, and probably when we get there it will not be so dreadful as we feared, for, after all, we have nothing to lose-George Orwell Writing in the Globe and Mail the Delhi based journalist Amrit Dhillon paints a despairingly gloomy picture[Read More…]
The last few months has seen open threats by Karni sena towards release of the movie ‘Padmavati’. They indulged in destroying film equipments, torching the movie, burning the poster sets at the time of making of the movie and announcing gifts for physically injuring Bhansali and Deepika Padukone. Recently violence was also seen in five states – Gujarat, Rajasthan, Haryana,[Read More…]
India is a complex nation with varied culture and multiple languages. India has the second highest languages(780) after Papua New Gunea (839) according to wikipedia. But according to readmeindia.com , there are as many as 880 languages in 2016 (Total Languages in India – Past and Present , September 10, 2016). Article 343 deals with official language. Estimates of[Read More…]
The penchant of development agencies for high-yielding cows has never abated. Whenever relief measures are planned for drought-affected families in villages, free cows are considered the best aid. I have seen several villages in my career where Holstein and Jersey’s cows arrive in wagonloads and every family in these parched villages is handed a cow. However, in a drought-affected[Read More…]
Mitchell Baker, Executive chairwomen of Mozilla published an open letter responding to the Srikrishna Committee. Mitchell is asking for indian community members and friends of Mozilla to support the demands by cosigning this letter. In 2017, the Government of India set up a committee headed by Justice Srikrishna to examine a data protection framework and draft India’s first comprehensive data[Read More…]
India’s democracy, social setup and secularism is in grave danger. And this danger has become more visible now. The pace with which Indian society is indoctrinated with the hatred of muslims, dalits and other marginal communities is increasing with each passing day. Killing of dalits and muslims on smaller pretexts is going on with no stop to these heinous[Read More…]
The BJP last year observed September 17, as Liberation of Hyderabad Day’, celebrating the Indian government’spolice action’ (a euphemism for what was actually a military invasion) in 1948, which led to the integration of the Nizam’s princely state into the Indian Union. It claims that its political ancestors (members of the Arya Samaj, Hindu Mahasabha, RSS and other[Read More…]
Dear Rahul, ( A Tryst with Congress? ) Felt like writing to you after your being hailed as the new messiah of Indian secularism. Today you charm the youth and warm our hearts. This new avatar is refreshing, what with your carrying your own luggage, standing in an airport queue, watching Star Wars or wishing a grandma happy b’day.[Read More…]
The scene of thugs in the street throwing stones at innocent school children send a chilling message that the Hindutva groups are deliberately using the entire Padmavat controversy to mobilise their disgruntled caste groups. In a democratic state, we have to abide by the institutions and their authorities. If the Supreme Court has cleared the film Padmavat, we don’t[Read More…]
Dr Rajagopala Chidambaram, one of India’s distinguished experimental physicists having immense contribution in developing the country as a formidable nuclear power, inspired generations of scientists in making outstanding contributions to many aspects of basic science and nuclear technology. On the sidelines of 8th Indian Particle Accelerator Conference (InPAC) held in Indore from January 9 to 12, Sourav Banerjee catches[Read More…]
Political gathering in political activity is a significant phenomenon in Indian democracy what we are regularly experienced. We see that a huge crowd congregates whenever the particular political party calls for in a particular place and date. Density of a crowd varies sometimes because the party rules the then government it obviously claims the highest congregation. Is it due to[Read More…]
An aadivasi woman died of hunger in Dhowadnagal village in Hiranpur block of this Jharkhand district. According to the villagers, the woman, identified as Lakhi Murmu (30), had not received food grains under the PDS scheme for the past four months resulting in her starvation death since she could not link her Aadhaar card to the PDS scheme. The villagers[Read More…]
The Indian village has, for long, been viewed as a convenient entry-point for understanding Indian society. At the beginning of the 20th century, Mahatma Gandhi had emphatically declared: “The soul of India lives in its villages”. Even after 70 years of Independence, in the wake of urbanisation, villages are at the core of the country’s soul. For social anthropologists,[Read More…]
The Government of India celebrated the 1st year of demonetization. Opposition of the Government observed “Kala Dibas”. Demonetization was a foul programme. However, initially, people in Bottom of Pyramid were very happy, and they thought that it was good step. They believed that rich people would become poor and they would get monetary rewards from the Government in their[Read More…]
Threats to databases In an age of exploding data, information and knowledge, both human and machine, cyber security is as much a necessity for personal privacy as it is for internal and external national security, or for day-to-day economic activities and operation of social and economic infrastructure systems. Cyber security also constitutes the defensive part of modern warfare[Read More…]
“The Prime Minister wants a ‘New India’. Employment needs in that new India could only be fulfilled through revival and development of agriculture. Corporate industries would create jobless growth. Need of the hour is to keep the interest of farmers on priority.” Swaminathan, whose 2006 report on agriculture has been used in election manifestos of BJP, has demanded the[Read More…]
In India, there is a push to drive people from the countryside into cities. The mainstream narrative implies that urbanisation is natural in the evolution of societies and constitutes progress. The World Bank wants India to relocate 400 million people to urban centres. Former Chief Finance Minister P. Chidambaram once stated that 85% of the population would eventually live in[Read More…]
Hindutva brigade continues to pretend to have great admiration for Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose (23 January 1897–18 August 1945) who attempted to organise a military campaign to force the British out of India. But very few people know about the terrible betrayal of his cause by the Hindu Mahasabha under the leadership of Savarkar who was also adored by the[Read More…]
Hindu Rashtra benefits from the miserable underfunding of the Indian judiciary leading to what is objectively speaking a dysfunctional and for the poor more or less non-functional judiciary. The millions of cases pending at all levels of the Indian judiciary benefit Narendra Modi and Amit Shaw’s Hindu Rashtra project by encouraging extra-judicial settlement of disputes. In a functioning system[Read More…]
Childhood is in difficult circumstances in various places across the globe. Global processes and societal structure shape childhood in different domains of children’s lives. Various social, economic, cultural, and political agencies (e.g., parents, family, governments) are responsible for unhappy and lost childhood. Children are the future continuance of societies, and have therefore been trained to replicate the material and intellectual[Read More…]
According to a news report from the capital, the 2018 Union Budget will be Modi budget as the PM is meeting finance minister Arun Jaitley and top officials of the PMO & finance ministry on a daily basis. Normally, the prime ministers have adopted hands-off approach to the budget-making exercise and interact with their FMs once or twice on policy[Read More…]
Education at the school level, though it takes years to bear fruits, is recognized as crucial factor for social ,economic and cultural development. Education is an important indicator of inclusive growth and social change. School level education is the most crucial stage spanning the first fifteen years of life. It lays the foundation for the development of the child’s[Read More…]
Evolution of scientific mind serves as a prerequisite to the scientific evolution of society requiring a sustained commitment to science, and its governance “Science is a beautiful gift to humanity; we should not distort it,” remarked Dr A.P. J. Abdul Kalam – a quintessential name in the arena of Indian space and nuclear technology. Early this month, the annual session[Read More…]
Co-Written by Ashish Kumar Singh & Lenin Raghuvanshi Knowing how to read is knowing how to walk. Knowing how to write is knowing how to ascend. Feet, arms, wings, all these are given to man By his first and most humble schoolbooks[i]. Education is the primary vehicle by which marginalized individuals and communities lift themselves from the vicious circle of[Read More…]
A development professional’s career demands not just technical skills but empathy; not a form of empathy that comes from superiority, but one born from a profound humility. l’ve learned hard lessons that have shaped my ideas about good principles and practices in development. The most abiding lesson is that we should value people over projects, and at the same time value[Read More…]
I was impressed by the pleasant ambience of the Trivandrum railway station and the bus depot for long distance travel which is just across the road. This is how public transport should be but this has become so rare due to the callousness of our politicians and bureaucrats. The whole area is clean. And travel is really seamless. I[Read More…]
The ICCABI a group of academics, activists and artists in India, came together in 2010 to campaign against yet another apartheid regime by extending support to the international campaign for the academic and cultural boycott of Israel. They have issued the following statement which, in essence, calls on citizens committed to dismantling apartheid in Israel to refuse to be a[Read More…]
A recent report by IndiaSpend states that professional moneylenders, who can charge up to four times more interest than the government’s banking system, hold more rural debt than ever, from 19.6 percent in 2002 to 28.2 percent in 2013. According to a 2017 study by Stanford University’s Center on Global Poverty and Development, farmers take loans from informal sources at high rates of interest[Read More…]
It is the patriarchal fixation with fathers and husbands as feudal heads of indian households where sanctities are attached to family units, that leads to normalization of corruption in a judicial system that is unsurprisingly spearheaded by the brahminical chiefs. No matter what the chief of the family does, it has to be a hush-hush affair and not be made[Read More…]
Net neutrality has been one of the most studied and controversial areas of policy making for nearly one-and-a-half-decades now, since the term was coined back in 2003. As the US has been the most innovative nation in fueling the digital revolution globally, much of the regulations on it also has originated from the US, namely the Federal Communications Commission[Read More…]
The planned Joint Citizens Protest against world biggest Central Identities Data Repository (CIDR) of 12 –digit biometric Unique Identification (UID)/Aadhaar numbers happened at the Parliament Street from 3 pm onwards on12th of January, 2018. More such protests are planned across the districts and cities in the country. Several speakers at the protest site demanded immediate stoppage of the biometric UID/Aadhaar number database project. [Read More…]
The Indian Association of People’s Lawyers applauds the courageous step taken by the four senior-most judges of the Supreme Court in placing, before “we, the people” as the ultimate authority, the impasse that has been created by the refusal of the Chief Justice of India to respond to their legitimate and responsible concerns over his recent administrative actions. In their[Read More…]
The People’s Union For Civil Liberties (PUCL) is seriously concerned over the implication of issues raised by the 4 senior most SC judges after the Chief Justice of India (CJI) going public about their disagreement with the CJI over functioning of the judicial institution both in its administrative as also judicial sphere of functioning. In the Press Conference today, all[Read More…]
Ignoring this morning Friday January 12 2017 press conference held by Justice Chelameswar the senior most Justice of India after the Chief Justice, along with the next three senior most judges of the Supreme Court, at his home in New Delhi, the Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra continued with business as usual at the Supreme Court. At their[Read More…]
In an unprecdented move four judges of the Supreme Court of India went public with their grievances against the Chief Justice of India, Dipak Misra by holding a press conference. They said democracy in India is at stake. NDTV reported: They said that repeated attempts to alert the Chief Justice to their concerns -including a meeting with him this morning-[Read More…]
As my nation stands betrothed to World Hunger Index and Bullet train, it is quite incomprehensive, which beau she will meet at the altar-towards the end of 2019. The cacophony for more power, more votes, more solidarity grows within the usual suspects of political alliances. With each passing day India descends into another abyss of political turmoil, the stakes[Read More…]
“Our society has become so unequal. The wealthy need to be taxed more” -Rohini Nilekani In an information saturated age such as ours corporate spin is sine qua non of business reporting where the narrative is controlled by the few to the detriment of the many. None is more evident than in the dominant narrative leading to the resignation of[Read More…]
Subramanyam Swami, a BJP leader, said, development alone was not enough to garner votes in elections, what was required was emotions and that in turn, required a cultural awareness. (Times of India, 27th November, 16) This is what Golwalkar had said earlier. He said ‘We have achieved mind revolution ‘man kranti ‘ The victory of BJP in the recent elections[Read More…]
The Political Economy of Hindu Rashtra is a mix of manic use of State power to line the pockets of the upper castes combined with abject subjection of the State to the globalisation of finance. By this means since 2014 BJP may have achieved its aim of establishing Hindu Rashtra in India and communalising the political discourse for the[Read More…]
To The Editor in Chief The Tribune Harish Khare Sir, I, as a common, unemployed youth of this country like many others unemployed and distressed youths, who have been struggling to survive every day with the hope that “acchhe din” will arrive, would like to thank you for exposing the sham of this so called democracy who first give us[Read More…]
A number of journalistic forums including Editors Guild of India have condemned the filing of FIR against Rachna Khaira, a reporter of The Tribune who exposed the data breach of UIDAI that implements Indiia’s coercive and panopticon AAdhaar cards. Editors Guild of India released this stement: The Editors Guild of India is deeply concerned over reports that the Deputy Director[Read More…]
A lot has been discussed about ‘Aadhar’ and its impact on common people. Economists, political and social scientists and many other academicians have elaborately analysed the futility of the project. One more angle of introspecting aadhar is the impact on disabled persons, especially those who have problems with their fingers or eyes or both. While the poor are facing[Read More…]
The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt In India, the priorities of village people are constantly undergoing changes. These are, in fact, a result of the changes the development landscape is undergoing.[Read More…]
In perhaps the biggest identity data breach in history, India’s entire Aadhaar data has been breached by fraudsters and over one billion Aadhaar details that includes name, address, postal code (PIN), photo, phone number and email are on sail for just Rs 500. Unique Identification Authority of India’s (UIDAI) Central Identities Data Repository (CIDR) is the biggest collection of identities[Read More…]
We are guilty of many errors and many faults, but our worst crime is abandoning the children, neglecting the fountain of life. Many of the things we need can wait. The child cannot. Right now is the time his bones are being formed, his blood is being made, and his senses are being developed. To him we cannot answer ‘Tomorrow,’[Read More…]
Etwariya Devi, a 67-year-old widow, died of hunger and exhaustion on 25 December in Sonpurwa village of Majhiaon block of Garhwa district (Jharkhand). She lived with her son Ghura Vishwakarma, daughter-in-law Usha Devi and their three children in a dilapidated kutcha house. The family has a hand-to-mouth existence and is routinely unable to access adequate nutrition. Surviving the day on[Read More…]
As a new year begins, it becomes necessary to review the legal pronouncements of the past year. 2017 has been replete with many significant judgments by the Supreme Court for India’s jurisprudence. While there are some judgments worthy of mention for the controversial nature and media reportage associated to it, such as that of Ram Rahim’s conviction, upholding of sentence[Read More…]
As another year is coming to an end, we witnessed huge turmoil everywhere. The intimidation to dissenters continued while political opponents were targeted as usual by the Hindutva groups. Mob lynching and cow terrorism aggravated all over the country and as the state remained subdued and muted, the goons with political patronage had a field day during the year.[Read More…]
Union Minister, Mr. Anant Kumar Hegdeji,It is frightening to have to listen to the words you have spoken at Kuknoor in YelburgaTaluk.‘Those who are unaware of their parentage are the ones who call themselves secularists’you say deridingly.Now we have to make you aware of your own parentage – It is hatred that is your father, intolerance your mother, illusion your[Read More…]
Son of Kargil martyr in Haryana’s Sonipat accused that he lost his mother after she was denied treatment in a hospital due to an unavailability of the Aadhaar card. Wife of a Kargil martyr dies at a hospital in Haryana's Sonipat, claims son; says "I brought my mother in a serious condition to the hospital. They asked me to get[Read More…]
It is not just BJP minister Anantkumar Hegde. Here is a look at some past attempts of the RSS-BJP to tinker with the Constitution. “Line wahan se shuru hoti hai jahan ham khade rehte hain” (The queue starts from the point where we stand). Remember that 70s Bollywood film where teh then bad boy of Hindi cinema (Shatrughan Sinha) barges into[Read More…]<