Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• 

  A Haunting portrait of forgotten Agariyas of Kutch: A Review of Anita Agnihotri’s "The Touch of Salt" | Bhavna Harchandani

  9 November 2024

  [fond noir][blanc]BOOK REVIEWblanc]fond noir]
  __0__
  A touch of salt
  By Anita Agnihotri
  Translated by Arunava Sinha
  Penguin Books
  2024 / 180 pages
  ISBN 9780143465812
  __0__
  Reviewed by Bhavna Harchandani
  Anita Agnihotri’s "The Touch of Salt", masterfully translated by Arunava Singh, is a poignant and evocative novel that sheds light on the overlooked lives of salt cultivators in the Little Rann of Kutch, Gujarat. The eleven-chapter book critically examines the historical (…)

• 

  Review of Puia’s Nationalism in the Vernacular: State, Tribes, and the Politics of Peace in Northeast India | P Kham Sian Muan Zou

  9 November 2024

  [fond noir][blanc]BOOK REVIEWblanc]fond noir]
  __0__
  Nationalism in the Vernacular: State, Tribes, and the Politics of Peace in Northeast India
  by Roluah Puia
  Cambridge University Press
  2023
  ISBN: 9781009346078
  __0__
  Reviewed by P Kham Sian Muan Zou
  Roluahpuia

• 

  Photos: Tenzing Norgay & Sir Edmund Hilary after reaching the world

  9 November 2024
• 

  Audio: Hang Massive - Once Again - 2011 (hang drum duo) | Danny Cudd & Markus Johansson

  9 November 2024
• 

  Table of Contents, Mainstream, Nov 2, 2024

  2 November 2024

  * 2024 US Presidential Election on a Knife’s Edge | Vijay Kumar
  * Kumar David: a Broadminded Marxist | Rajan Philips
  * From chits to chatbots: cheating in India

• Letter to the Readers, Mainstream, Nov 2, 2024

  2 November 2024

  The decadal population enumeration process for India dates back to colonial times and has been held in the post-independence period in regular cycles under the 1948 Census of India Act. The last census was due in 2021 but was postponed on grounds of health risks due to the COVID-19 pandemic, even though in the following years the Government allowed huge-scale countrywide elections. Population data collated by the census is essential for welfare programme planning in any country. Currently, (…)

• US Presidential Election and the Perils of Excessive Decentralisation | Vijay Kumar

  2 November 2024, by Vijay Kumar

  The November 5 US Presidential Election is heading for a breathtaking photo finish. As latest opinion poll conducted by the New York Times shows, both Donald Trump and Kamala Harris are poised neck to neck.
  The US Presidential election is regulated by peculiar regulations. The popular votes secured by candidates are not decisive; what clinches the outcome is majority secured in the Electoral College.
  Unlike India, which is quasi-federal state, the US is a hardcore federal country, as it (…)

• Marxist political parties in Bengal must look beyond outdated populist moves for emerging as the powerful force | Arun Srivastava

  2 November 2024

  by Arun Srivastava
  Is the modern Middle Class the vanguard for a Marxist agitation? This is the question that is making round in the academic and intellectual circles. Probably this question might not have attained so much of seriousness if the Marxists had not put huge amount of stake on the Junior doctors, who have been agitating seeking justice for their woman medic colleague and fighting corruption prevailing inside the health system for last 72 days, for reaching out to the urban (…)

• Modi Finds a New Enemy | J P Gadkari

  2 November 2024, by J P Gadkari

  November 1, 2024
  Prime Minister Narendra Modi has found a "new enemy" to attack in most of his discourses whom he calls "Urban Naxals". He accuses them of trying to "destabilise" India by "tarnishing its image by joining hands with domestic and foreign forces".
  Modi unleashed this campaign against the "Urban Naxals" for the first time in his address to a jubilant crowd of BJP workers celebrating the victory of the party in Haryana Assembly elections at party headquarters in Delhi. (…)

• Will Congress repeat Haryana in Maharashtra | Faraz Ahmad

  2 November 2024, by Faraz Ahmad

  Has the Congress learnt any lessons from its awful defeat in the Haryana Assembly elections, last month? Or rather is it going to repeat the same mistake in Maharashtra Assembly elections slated for the 20th of this month? It appears so.
  We may still believe that Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, is sincere about an inclusive Congress and an equally accommodative INDIA alliance, committed to ensuring its joint victory to defeat the BJP at the prospective Assembly (…)