Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• Nehru, Maoism and Bhadralok

  10 July 2010, by Dipak Malik

  Congress General Secretary Digvijay Singh’s missive against Chidambaram’s law and order driven Green Hunt Operation has drawn the attention of the entire nation. After a free for all, untramelled journey, scripted by the neo-liberals, this was definitely a timely break which reminds us that the Congress ought to go back to its roots, much of what was crafted out of the Nehru and essentially Gandhi discourse. The Congress party need not take recourse to the long dead agenda of Cold War (…)

• I Have Seen Her Crying

  10 July 2010, by Gladson Dungdung

  On June 13, 2010, we, 12 human rights activists of Jharkhand, started our journey before dawn. We had heard a horrible story about an Adivasi woman who was killed in crossfire between the security forces and the Maoists. Her name was Jasinta. She was a mere 25-year-old married woman enjoying her life with her family in a village. Of course, she was a mother of three kids whose lives are at stake now. Therefore, we wanted to know the truth. We wanted to know whether she was a Maoist. The most (…)

• China-Taiwan Relations: A Comment

  10 July 2010, by Gunjan Singh

  China since 1949 has claimed that Taiwan is not only an inalienable part but also an internal matter of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). But at the same time one sees that there exists a very strong dimension to the Taiwan affair. Since the 1980s there has been a major shift in this dynamics. After its democratisation in the 1980s it has clearly formed a very unique characteristic vis-à-vis China. These differences have been the cause of a number of clashes. Mainland China did show its (…)

• Manmohan’s Progress

  10 July 2010, by Nikhil Chakravartty

  With Parliament rounding off the general debate on the Budget, this is the point of time when certain reflections on the government’s presentation of the economic crisis before the nation may be in order.
  Right at the outset, there was both curiously and appreciation on the Prime Minister having chosen a distinguished economist as his Finance Minister. An outsider in the arena of party politics, Dr Manmohan Singh raised expectations that he would present before the nation a fairly (…)

• Why are Multinational Companies So Keen to Push Hazardous GM/GE Crops?

  10 July 2010, by Bharat Dogra

  Eminent scientists, who have examined the technology of genetically engineered (GE) or genetically modified (GM) crops, have come to a clear conclusion that it is a highly hazardous and risky technology. For example, eminent scientists from several countries, who comprise the Independent Science Panel (ISP), have drawn this conclusion after studying various aspects of GM crops. “GM crops have failed to deliver the promised benefits and are posing escalating problems on the farm.....GM crops (…)

• On PM’s Trip to the Valley, Israel goes Killing

  10 July 2010, by Humra Quraishi

  Sometime ago I had written that Sonia Gandhi’s advisers ought to have told her to move beyond Jammu. Towards those particular locales in the Valley where the affected families, of those slain in the fake encounters or those raped and murdered by the security forces, just about survive. And now I wish to dwell a little more on this aspect—though Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was in the Valley, his advisers kept him away from meeting the family of the two Shopian women who had been brutally (…)

• Colours of Democracy

  10 July 2010, by Arup Kumar Sen

  India has a long argumentative tradition in spite of its many failures. The tradition is reflected in our public debates. The debates, in their turn, make us aware of the less explored aspects of our social reality. Some of the recent interventions of public intellectuals are revisited below to enlighten us about the modalities of our governance.
  Information technology has undergone a revolution in recent years. But, what kind of information do we get in public life? Mrinal Pande has (…)

• Mounting Public Revulsion

  27 June 2010, by SC

  As we go to press, the Union Cabinet is learnt to have accepted the recommendations of the Group of Ministers set up by the UPA Government to revisit the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy and suggest means to help the victims after more than 25 years.
  It was proposed by several persons, including Opposition politicians, that the GoM’s action plan should be placed before an all-party committee as well as organisations striving secure justice for the Bhopal victims for the past quarter of a century (…)

• The Lengthening Shadow over Kabul

  27 June 2010, by Apratim Mukarji

  The recent spate of exposures in Western media about Pakistan’s heightened ambition of expanding its “srategic depth” in Afghanistan, which was severely dented in the post-9/11 period, serves to strengthen the traditional skepticism about the long-term efficacy of a search for peace in South Asia.
  The “trust deficit” between themselves that both India and Pakistan aspire to reduce through renewed dialogue is being expanded quite effectively at this very moment by Islamabad’s well-planned (…)

• Letter to the Bihar Chief Minister

  27 June 2010, by Shree Shankar Sharan

  Respected Chief Minister,
  Patna made history again by rebuffing an attempt to throw doubts on her deepest ideals, notwithstanding the spat it caused between the two members of the NDA with a limited common programme. The BJP clearly violated the terms of the alliance on the occasion of its National Executive meet at Patna by using it as a platform for claiming false and misleading proximity and warmth between the Bihar and Gujarat CMs when there had been none after the horrendous Gujarat (…)