Politics of Food and Hungry Indians
by K.P. PRABHAKARAN NAIR In 1948, when the United Nations adopted the “Right to Food” covenant, and subsequently India became a signatory to this, none expected that the government of free India, after...
View ArticleThe Future of Democracy
I. Setting and Argument Between December 18, 2010 and September 17, 2011, three events in different parts of the world highlighted the issue of the future of democracy as central to the social and...
View ArticleEnigma of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh
Dr K.S. Hedgewar, who had originally worked with Mahatma Gandhi and was in the Congress, founded the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) at Nagpur in 1925. When Mahatma Gandhi asked Dr Hedgewar why he...
View ArticleRise of the Voiceless
Pull down the ‘Work in Progress' boards. Sixty-five years is far too long. No curtains can hide away the pole-vaults of the me-myself-self-seekers' brigade of pygmies in the Temple. How long can you...
View ArticleUneasy Twilight
FROM N.C.'S WRITINGS When a cliche boomerangs the effect is devastating. The golden jubilee of the August Revolution, officially celebrated with so much fanfare, has brought no dividends for those in...
View ArticleReturn to the Roots
A year ago just before Independence Day 2011 it was written in these columns: As we approach our sixtyfifth Independence Day there is no gainsaying that an acute sense of despondency has gripped the...
View ArticleBeijing's South China Sea Pledge
China has moderated its stance on the South China Sea. It has now said that it is committed to settling the South China Sea dispute by peaceful means with the countries concerned through direct and...
View ArticleLatin America: Another World is Possible
With the entrenchment of democracy, new paradigms of governance are emerging in Latin America. Some would say, a new Latin America is emerging, with a new trajectory of growth, stability and...
View ArticleWest Bengal: Division in the Pro-Paribartan Camp on Mamata's Politics
by Biswajit Roy Is Mamata still Bengal's Joan of Arc? Has she turned into a female version of Caligula, at least, halfway through the transformation? After a year of ‘Paribartan' in Bengal, the non-CPM...
View ArticleSwaraj under a Cloud?
by Hargopal Singh India was ‘granted full self-government' under the Independence Act 1947 passed by the British Parliament and assented to by King George VI during the Labour Party Government led by...
View ArticleTribute: A.K. Hangal and Communist Party
by Shameem Faizee I last met comrade A.K. Hangal at his residence in Bandra in the last week of April this year. I had gone to brief him on the decisions of the 21st Congress of the CPI held in March....
View ArticlePursuit of Julian Assange is an Assault on Freedom and a Mockery of Journalism
by John Pilger The British Government's threat to invade the Ecuadorean embassy in London and seize Julian Assange is of historic significance. David Cameron, the former PR man to a television industry...
View ArticleHate Campaign, Ecuador, Citizenship Issue
Going backwards. These happenings and the ongoing offshoots pull you backwards towards the times of Partition, when trains carried petrified beings from here to there, when fear and anarchy reigned,...
View ArticleA Flicker of Hope, at last
Some recognition at last: That both President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh should send messages of goodwill to the Hind-Pak Dosti Manch is a welcome development. The Manch is...
View ArticleReflections On Our Time
From N.C.'s Writings The concluding functions that brought the curtain down on the year-long celebrations of the golden jubilee of the ‘Quit India' struggle of 1942, presented in sharp relief the slump...
View ArticleSatyagraha and Political Power
On August 2, 2012, Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer and several other eminent citizens made a statement calling upon Anna Hazare and his associates to end fasting and “focus their energies on creating an...
View ArticleIn Gujarat What You See is not What You Get
This is a story that beggars belief, and puts into the shade everything we have thus far known of Narendra Modi's prowess at chicanery and subterfuge. Indeed, had a report on this not appeared in so...
View ArticleDissecting the Bodo-Muslim Clashes and Attacks on North-East People
The electronic media beamed images of thou-sands of people from the North-East climbing on to trains at Majestic Railway Station in Bangalore heading home to Guwahati. This panic was caused by...
View ArticleUnderstanding Conflict in BTAD of Assam
by Arup Kumar Deka From the third week of July, western Assam has been witnessing violent clashes between the Bodos and non-Bodos living in the Bodo Territorial Autonomous District (BTAD) area. The...
View ArticleIran Hosts the 16th NAM Summit
by Sudhanshu Tripathi The successful inauguration of the Non-Aligned Summit at Tehran proves once again the underlying spirit of unity among its member nations, though it has yet to deal with the...
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