Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• India Facing Economic Emergency

  22 September 2013

  by Pranjit Agarwala
  India is facing an economic emergency with the free fall of the rupee and a high rate of food and fuel inflation despite comparative stability in the global crude oil and commodity markets. Fluctuations in the international currency markets are quite common and any excess volatility is normally absorbed by the economy’s inherent structural checks and balances. But the Indian economy’s built-in course corrections, necessary in a globalised economy, are apparently weak (…)

• Modi’s ’Vanzara’ Moment: Encounter Killings as State Policy?

  22 September 2013, by Subhash Gatade

  This article was written before the BJP leadership formally decided to make Narendra Modi its prime ministerial candidate.
  Resignation letters of suspended officers—who are in jail under serious charges—are never a cause of concern for the powers that be. But with Dahyaji Gobarji Vanzara, the suspended DIG of the Gujarat Police and head of its Anti-Terrorist Squad, who once happened to be very close to the powers that be and has the potential of further embarrassing them, the situation is (…)

• Letter from Germany: Social Democrats Face a Tough Task in the Federal Elections

  22 September 2013

  by Arani Basu
  This article reached us sometime ago but could not be used earlier due to unavoidable reasons.
  With federal elections round the corner, it is a matter of concern for the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and Christian Democratic Union (CDU) if the next government in Germany would be able to save the country from financial crisis—a malice gone viral all over Europe. Economically stability therefore is undoubtedly the biggest deciding factor when it comes to analysing this year’s (…)

• Agenda that Failed: Left Politics in Post-colonial India

  22 September 2013

  by Abhijit Ghosh
  Introduction Is sixtyfive years (1947-2012) enough time to declare that any political agenda has failed? But more than half-a-century is a reasonable period to dissect any political agenda. Left politics in these sixtyfive years failed to leave any effective mark on the Indian political system barring a few exceptions. Several political complexities had developed in the Indian political scenario during the British departure from the country. While the Muslim League with (…)

• Vinod Raina

  22 September 2013, by Bharat Dogra

  TRIBUTE
  Vinod Raina, the eminent educationist who made a significant contribution to the right to education legislation and to enriching science education at the grassroots, breathed his last in Delhi on September 12. He had been suffering from cancer.
  Raina (1950-2013) left a comfortable job as a Physics teacher in Delhi University to devote himself to strengthening science and education at the grassroots. This included a lot of work in Hoshangabad district (Madhya Pradesh), preparing (…)

• Dr Sanjay Kumar Biswas (1945-2013)

  22 September 2013, by Ambrose Pinto

  TRIBUTE
  Sanjay was a Professor at the Indian Institute of Science and I was a teacher at St. Joseph’s College. He was a mechanical engineer and I taught political science. While he was a Communist, I was a Jesuit, a member of the Catholic Church. He was a Bengali and I am a Mangalorean, born and bred in the State (Karnataka). We met more than two decades ago. We were different and yet not once did we feel that we were not comrades in a common mission. We grew into intimate friends and (…)

• Message from a Lady of Exceptional Courage

  22 September 2013

  TRIBUTE
  Vivek Kumar Srivastava
  Why is the killing of Sushmita Banerjee so impactful for India, the world and women in particular? Not for the reason that she was assassinated in a gruesome manner by those people who still symbolise primitiveness in the modern age, but for the reason that she was a symbol of courage, steadfastness, and unflinching faith in human values and lived with a concern for the common people who had no other option in life except to coexist with the orthodoxies, (…)

• My Second Innings: “Battling” for Urdu with the Chief Minister of Delhi

  22 September 2013

  by Ather Farouqui
  Distinguished readers of Mainstream may remember my article, “Urdu Needs Kiss of Life and Not Myopic Policies” (vol. L, no.33, August 4, 2012), which was very critical of the policies of the Delhi Chief Minister, Ms Sheila Dikshit, as far as the promotion of Urdu language was concerned.
  I argued in that piece that Ms Dikshit was simply enamoured of the idea of Urdu as a ‘language of culture’ romanticising it if you will, while ignoring the vital need for making it an (…)

• Threat to Constitutional Structure

  22 September 2013, by Nikhil Chakravartty

  From N.C.’s Writings
  A situation of unprecedented confusion synchronising with the onset of serious crisis for the entire constitutional structure of the Indian state presents before the nation today.
  On the one side is the outright challenge of the BJP, the most aggressive of political parties, threatening to defy the entire administration in a manner never seen before; and on the other, the ruling party at the Centre presents a picture of utter disunity with factions not only (…)

• A New Role for India in Myanmar

  22 September 2013, by Sonu Trivedi

  Given the transition taking place in Myanmar from authoritarianism to democracy in the midst of ongoing communal and ethnic violence on the one hand and reform initiatives by the new regime on the other, the Indian mission in Myanmar faces immense challenges as well as opportunities. How well it is going to capitalise on these opportunities and ward off challenges is going to have a wide-ranging impact on the future of India-Myanmar relations. However, the chore is not free from caveat. The (…)