Table of Contents - Mainstream, Jan 27, 2024

In this issue:

• Letter to the Readers, Mainstream, Jan 27, 2024
• Post-Ram temple inauguration politics | P S Jayaramu
• Multiple Meanings of Consecration Ceremony of Ram Temple | Arup Kumar Sen
• BJP spokesman pronounces Modi as ‘King’ and India a ‘Hindu Rashtra’ | Faraz Ahmad
• 75th Republic Day Marks the Traumatic Transmutation of "Democratic" India into "Hindu" India!? | Sukla Sen
• Post Ram temple inauguration, Hindutva goons out to intimidate | Humra Quraishi
• Placing Human Rights at the Heart of the Sanatana Dharma Debate: A View from Below | S Pandiaraj
• RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat and Narendra Modi twisting Hinduism to turn India into a Hindu Rashtra | Arun Srivastava
• The consecration of Ram in Ayodhya: View from Kathmandu | Namrata Sharma
• Poem: ‘The nation is not a map drawn on a piece of paper’ | Sarveshwar Dayal Saxena
• Informal Sector Workers Suffer on Both Sides of the Pollution Debate | Bharat Dogra
• Public Notice on ‘One Nation, One Election’ | K Gireesan
• ‘One Nation, One Election’ is a subversive idea based on delusions of monarchical grandeurr | Suhit K Sen
• Construction of Colonial Society it’s Madness in the Story of Dakmunish | Radhakanta Barik
• Karpoori Thakur: A Centennial Appraisal | Thakur and Bhattacharjee
• Left Perspectives on BJD’s Temporary Compromise or Permanent Invitation to Hindutva in Odisha | Bhabani Shankar Nayak
• Weaving Threads of Salvation with Pashmina, Par, and Vrindavani Vastra | Swaswati Borkataki
• Privacy and Publicity: Consumer culture & identity in the United States | Sunita Samal
• Electoral uncertainty casts a shadow over Sri Lanka’s progress | Neil DeVotta
• The necessity of equality | Harry Shutt

DOCUMENTS:

• An Open Letter from Foreign Correspondents Based in India in Defense of French Journalist Vanessa Dougnac | Jan 26, 2024
• International Court of Justice ruling in favour of South Africa in its case to prevent Genocide in Gaza | Text of Order Jan 26, 2024

BOOKS:

• Book Review: The Scars of Democracy - Theodor Adorno and the crises of liberalism | Peter E. Gordon
• A Hard Look at Indian Muslims and Secularism | M.R. Narayan Swamy

IMAGE & SOUND:

• Drawing of Root of Jerusalem artichoke from Nehemiah Grew’s The Anatomy of Plants (1682)
• Audio: Multidimensional Poverty in India - Decoding the Niti Ayog Report
• Music: Efisio Melis & Antonio Lara - Fiuda Bagadia | Luneddas Magiche
• Video: Writing, Theatre & Activism - a conversation with Wole Soyinka

Editor’s Picks:

• Slow Death of India’s Secular Democracy
• As petals rained down and celebrities beamed, Modi unveiled his vision of a Hindu India
• How the Hindu Right Triumphed in India
• The idea of Ram, and the idea of India
• India braces for a potent brew of majoritarianism and authoritarianism in 2024
• Adani Ports: The Tamil Nadu villagers taking on a billionaire’s port plan
• In Imphal, the state’s surrender to an armed Meitei militia with ‘Taliban-like’ grip
• The Failed Saint: On George Orwell’s India
• Myanmar’s rebels take on the junta from above
• Israel Has Nothing Left to Gain From the War. Stop Sending Our Children to Die in Gaza
• ’Send back our husbands’ - Russian women in rare protest
• AfD: Germans float ban on elected far-right party after scandal
• Germany cracks down on ’pro-life’ protests
• Dependency theory meets feminist economics: a research agenda
• Groundwater decline is global but not universal
• Breaking Through review: Katalin Karikó’s amazing Nobel story

* (Coverpage Artwork Credits: Harsh Kapoor )