Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• Kashmir: Two Statements

  6 October 2010

  We condemn the reported reinstatement of four police officers accused of tampering evidence in the Shopian rapes and murders case. Right from the very beginning the police tried to dismiss the rapes and murders of the two women, Neelofar and Asiya, whose badly bruised bodies were found in Rambiara nallah in Shopian in the morning of May 30, 2009, as cases of drowning, refused to lodge a first information report and made all possible efforts to tamper with evidence in the case. The policemen (…)

• Tripura: Strange Happenings in Red Citadel

  6 October 2010, by Basubrata Roy

  Strange things are happening in Tripura, the red citadel of the North-East.
  On August 28, a tribal widow, Baralakshmi Debbarma, of Anandanagar village in Sonamura Subdivision of Tripura, had a quarrel with the ex-CPI-M chairman, Shibcharan Debbarma’s sons, Manish and Uttam, over malpractices in the payment of NREGA money due; this infuriated Manish to beat up a pathetic Baralakshmi mercilessly, dragging her in a naked condition. Her younger daughter’s protest was met with the threats of (…)

• Beyond Negative Trends

  28 September 2010, by SC

  As we go to press, the news has come that the Supreme Court has deferred pronouncement of the Ayodhya verdict by the Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court. (The date fixed for the verdict was September 24.)
  On a petition filed in the Apex Court seeking more time for bringing about an out-of-court negotiated settlement of the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid dispute between the contending parties, the two-judge SC Bench came out with a split verdict: one judge rejected the petition on the (…)

• Washington’s Strategy in the Context of Afghan Elections

  28 September 2010, by Mansoor Ali

  The hard reality in Kabul today is that Washington is averse to the emergence of a strong leader in the Afghan capital enjoying an independent power base.
  This was quite evident from the US’ overdrive to tear apart President Hamid Karzai’s front with the Northern Alliance groups against the backdrop of the September 18 parliamentary elections in the South West Asian state. At the other end Karzai’s approach has been different: he is interested in working out a genuine reconciliation with (…)

• The Impending Ayodhya Verdict

  28 September 2010, by Rajindar Sachar

  Both the government and the Opposition and the public in general are rightly in panic awaiting the verdict on the Babri Masjid by the Allahabad High Court—a situation brought about by the faltering non-secular stand by all the concerned governments. The High Court is to give verdict on the following points:
  1. Was the place under the Babri Majid the birth-place of Lord Ram?
  2. Was there or not a temple on the land on which the Babri Masjid was built? Now it is obvious to the meanest (…)

• Pakistan and the Idea of “Neutral” Afghanistan

  28 September 2010, by Apratim Mukarji

  In early July this year, former Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif made a statement which forced many people inside and outside the country to sit up and take notice,
  “Pakistan should abandon this thinking that Pakistan has to keep influence in Afghanistan,” he told Dunya TV. “Neither will they (the Afghans) accept influence, nor should the pro-influence people here (in Pakistan) insist on it.” Continuing his rather stunning “confessional”, he said: “Our policy in the past has failed. (…)

• Relevance of the Telangana Armed Struggle

  28 September 2010, by Suravaram Sudhakar Reddy

  The Telangana armed struggle against Nizam’s autocracy in 1947 was an important historical event as Nizam declared Hyderabad as an independent country in connivance with British imperialism on September 11, 1947. The CPI had given a call asking the people to take up arms against the Nizam of Hyderabad Samsthan and for the merger of Hyderabad into the Indian Union. Comrades Ravi Narayan Reddy, Baddam Yella Reddy and Makhdoom Mohiuddin signed the statement on behalf of the CPI, Andhra (…)

• Karnataka: A Loud Wake-up Call

  28 September 2010, by Sandeep Shastri

  Karnataka was witness to hectic electoral activity in the last few weeks on account of the two by-elections to the State Assembly. These by-elections were held in two different corners of the State. One was held in northern Karnataka and the other in south Karnataka. The results would require all the major political forces in the State to do some serious soul-searching. The incumbent party has lost in both the seats. Does it signifiy anti-incumbency? Not necessarily. The incumbency factor (…)

• Deepening India-US Strategic Ties—Evidences and Repercussions

  28 September 2010, by S G Vombatkere

  It is necessary in today’s world of intimately linked national economies to strengthen and deepen economic and cultural ties between all nations in the interest of peace. This would also be a positive move to effectively combat the scourge of terrorism synergistically. But if economic ties are predicated on “fighting terror” by the use of police and military force and trade in military hardware and software, it would imply that the military-industrial complex (MIC) has an increasing role in (…)

• Maoist Phenomenon and State Response

  28 September 2010, by Amitava Mukherjee

  Now, in the wake of the serious development in Bihar, the time has come for everybody to shed all kinds of factionalism and put all heads together to find a genuine solution to the raging controversy over the Maoist problem that has engulfed a large part of India and is exhibiting the potentialities of vivisection of the country. Sadly, schism and incompetence in dealing with the most raging issue of the time has now reached the topmost level of administration with a deep gorge of difference (…)