Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• Marup System that Binds the Meiteis of Manipur Together

  12 December 2012, by J.J. Roy Burman

  The State of Manipur is in throes of militancy and violence for the last few decades. The Meiteis are the predominant people of the State principally inhabiting in the Imphal valley. The valley comprises about 10 per cent of the geographical area of the State. The surrounding hill areas are al inhabited by sundry tribesmen. The Meiteis are demographically almost 57 per cent of the population.
  The majority of the Meiteis are much peeved about the forced merger of the State with India in (…)

• Not Sorrow but Atonement

  12 December 2012, by Nikhil Chakravartty

  FROM N.C.’S WRITINGS
  The following piece, which was published as ‘Political Notebook’ in Mainstream (December 12, 1992), is being reproduced on the twentieth anniversary of the demolition of the Babri Masjid on December 6 this year.
  The vandalism that brought down the Babri Masjid structure on December 6 will remain a Black Sunday in the annals of independent India. Like the insensate violence of fratricidal communalism of the partition days that culminated in Gandhiji’s killing (…)

• Eric Hobsbawm: An Outstanding Marxist Theoretician

  12 December 2012, by Anil Rajimwale

  Eric Hobsbawm was a bold theorist, keeping alive the thought process of scientific Marxism as opposed to its mechanical and orthodox variety. He straddled the world of theory for long decades, leaving deep imprint on thought and practice. He was also an outstanding figure of the CPGB (Communist Party of Great Britain). His death has really made the world of Marxisn and theory much poorer.
  His was an eventful life, uncommon in certain senses. Eric Hobsbawm was born in Alexandria, Egypt, on (…)

• Questions of Freedom and People’s Emancipation — V

  12 December 2012, by Kobad Ghandy

  Kobad Ghandy from Tihar Jail is writing on the concept of freedom vis-s-vis present-day society as also in relation to a future just order, bringing out some causes for the failure of the erstwhile socialist states. It will comprise a series of six articles. The first article (covering Part I—The Context) appeared in Mainstream’s Independence Day Special (August 18, 2012), the second one (covering Part II—Search for Freedom through History) in this journal’s September 15, 2012 issue, the (…)

• China’s Energy Insecurity: Challenges in the Twentyfirst Century

  12 December 2012

  by DIVYA GANGADAR
  Introduction
  In a highly industrial and mechanised world that we live in today, energy in all forms becomes crucial to the success of a nation. Energy security refers to the uninterrupted availability of energy sources at an affordable price. With the world’s largest population, a rapidly emerging middle class and the fastest growing export market, China has surpassed the US as the world’s top energy consumer.
  According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), China (…)

• Jan Sansad and the Countdown to 2014

  12 December 2012

  by B.D.
  The organisation of Jan Sansad or People’s Assembly by nearly 56 people’s organisations in New Delhi from November 26 to November 30 is an important milestone in people’s reaffirmation of constitutional vales and their determination to protect these values from the onslaught of various vested interests.
  This People’s Assembly was organised at a time of the government’s increasing drift towards anti-people decisions in recent times, and long delays in passing or even discussing (…)

• Life and Times of a Journalist

  12 December 2012

  BOOK REVIEW
  by B.R.P. BHASKAR
  The Scribe Remembered: N. Gopinathan Nair, His Life and Times (Janayugom Gopiye Orkumbol) edited and published by K. Saradamoni; 2012; pp. 482; b&w plates 14, colour plates 10; Rs 450, US $ 25; ISBN: 978-93-5087-055-6
  A few years ago the editor of an English language newspaper claimed he was the second most powerful man in India. Such exaggerated claims define the character of celebrity journa-lists today. When a media superstar writes the story of (…)

• Politics of Psychoanalysis and Human Rights of the Stranger

  12 December 2012, by Sunita Samal

  Introduction
  The predominant liberal multi-culturalist model has neglected the very direct encounter with the ‘human rights of the other’. The politics of psychoanalysis as the very core of inter-subjective relations is rooted in an unconscious structural relation to the realm that Lacan refers to as symbolic. What is the relationship of symbolic with human rights? His register of the symbolic is often a difficult concept to unpack. The Lacanian subject can change the destiny of an (…)

• Whither Congress?

  3 December 2012, by SC

  The logjam over how to discuss in Parliament the issue of the government’s introduction of FDI in retail has finally been broken today. The Manmohan Singh dispensation, having succeeded in bringing the DMK on board, is now confident of its numbers in the Lok Sabha; and hence it eventually agreed to the Opposition (primarily the BJP and Left) demand for discussion on the subject under relevant rules in both Houses that allow voting at the end of the debate. Such a possibility had been (…)

• People’s Movements say No to Cash Transfer, Yes to PDS

  3 December 2012

  by MOHAMMAD ALI
  A day after the Union Government rolled out cash transfer for subsidies and entitlements, Jan Sansad, a coalition of more than 60 people’s movements, rejected it for being “anti-people”.
  Terming the scheme “an attempt by the govern-ment to wash off its hands from the responsibility to provide basic services and social security to its citizens”, the coalition said direct cash transfer will have disastrous impact on the lives of the margi-nalised who are dependent on the (…)