Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• Crossing the Rubicon: Indo-Japan Nuclear Cooperation

  8 September 2010, by Prakash Pillai

  The Indo-Japan relationship scaled a new height after Japan successfully opted to negotiate with India regarding civil nuclear cooperation between the two states. The ice-breaking decision was taken on the sidelines of the G-20 summit in Toronto, where for the first time Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his new Japanese counter-part, Naoto Kan, discussed the global security situation, including the civil nuclear cooperation. On the following day (June 28, 2010) India and Japan commenced the (…)

• Crossing the Rubicon: Indo-Japan Nuclear Cooperation

  8 September 2010, by Prakash Pillai

  The Indo-Japan relationship scaled a new height after Japan successfully opted to negotiate with India regarding civil nuclear cooperation between the two states. The ice-breaking decision was taken on the sidelines of the G-20 summit in Toronto, where for the first time Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his new Japanese counter-part, Naoto Kan, discussed the global security situation, including the civil nuclear cooperation.

• Vivekananda—The Revolutionary Swami

  8 September 2010, by Ashok Celly

  Vivekananda was one of the most amazing personalities of modern India. Perhaps India has never witnessed a religious figure of the kind Vivekananda was. Far from renouncing the world, he was deeply involved with it. He completely redefined and revolutionised the concept of the Mahatma. The traditional Mahatma was supremely indifferent to his surroundings and the suffering of the people around him and sought his spiritual salvation alone practicing laissez faire of the spirit. Vivekananda (…)

• Should India Set Up a Sovereign Wealth Fund?

  8 September 2010, by Kavaljit Singh

  New Delhi’s proposal to establish a $ 10-billion sovereign wealth fund should be treated with caution. The necessary preconditions for setting up an SWF are squarely lacking in India. Besides, the purported objectives of the fund to pursue strategic investment opportunities abroad are highly debatable.

• Fresh Breeze from Niyamgiri Hills

  2 September 2010, by SC

  The Union Government, and the PM in particular, have reasons to heave a sigh of relief: the contentious civil nuclear liability Bill has been passed in the Lok Sabha—the outcome of a broad consensus between the Congress and BJP with the former giving in to the latter’s insistence on a crucial change in Section 17(b) of the legislation reinforcing thereby the liability of the supplier in the event of a nuclear mishap.
  However, this nuclear liability Bill was not the only issue that (…)

• Tryst with Destiny — Its Kismet on August 15, 2010

  2 September 2010, by V R Krishna Iyer

  Max Muller said of India, the following eologatary felicitations:
  If we were to look over the whole world to find out the country most richly endowed with all the wealth, power, and beauty that nature can bestow—in some parts a very paradise on earth—I should point to India. If I were asked under what sky the human mind has most fully developed some of its choicest gifts, has most deeply pondered over the greatest problems of life, and has found solutions of some of them which well (…)

• Black Economy and the Nation’s Ills: Would Churchill Feel Justified?

  2 September 2010, by Arun Kumar

  Another Independence day has come and gone with the usual reflections on the nation’s achievements and its ills. With the shadow of another round of ferocious protest/violence in Kashmir, the continuing Maoist movement (‘the biggest internal security threat’, according to the PM) and inflation troubling the common man and leading to a united Opposition onslaught in Parliament, the mood of the nation and the rulers was sombre. These are the biggest worries but the smaller ones are no less (…)

• Make the Directive Principles of State Policy Enforceable by Court

  2 September 2010, by Chaturanan Mishra

  There is worldwide discussion today about inclusive growth. Our government and Planning Commission have also mentioned it now. To make growth inclusive some measures like the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, Right to Information Act, Right to Education Bill, Right to Health Bill, Right to Food Bill etc. have been taken but none of these, barring the NREGA and RTI Act to some extent, is being implemented in a way that would help all the people concerned. If the government is really (…)

• Kashmir Diary: Where do We Go from Here?

  2 September 2010, by Tapan Bose

  August 13, 2010
  Four more were killed in the Valley. It was the first Friday, Jumma of the Holy month of Ramadan. The killing began immediately after the morning (fajar) prayer—in Trehgam near Kupwara, Bommai near Sopore and in Patan. Throughout the day in different parts of Srinagar slogan shouting youthful demonstrators and the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), aided by the Jammu and Kashmir Police, continued to clash. While there was no curfew in the morning, by mid-day it was (…)

• Iraq: Continuing Occupation with a New Codename

  2 September 2010, by Ninan Koshy

  “There are people in Washington who never intend to withdraw military forces from Iraq and they are looking for ten, twenty, fifty years in the future. The reason that we went into Iraq was to establish a permanent military base in the Gulf region and I have never heard any of our leaders say that they would commit themselves to the Iraqi people that ten years from now there will be no military bases of the US in Iraq”
  —Jimmy Carter (former US President), February 3, 2006
  President Barak (…)