Mainstream Weekly

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• Interrogating the Ghost of Party Politics | Arup Kumar Sen

  8 April 2022, by Arup Kumar Sen

  Politics has become a part of everyday life of the people in 21st century India. A person is often judged solely by his/her political identity, irrespective of the will of the person. The ghost of this narrow identity politics has a long history.
  Phanishwar Nath Renu’s story, ‘Party Ka Bhoot’, published before India’s independence (1945), brilliantly portrayed the suffocating world of this identity politics. To put it in the words of the English translator of the story, Rakhshanda Jalil: (…)

• The Task Is Cut Out For The CPI-M at Its 23rd Congress

  8 April 2022

  by P. Sreekumaran
  April 5, 2022
  Thiruvananthapuram: All eyes are riveted on Kannur in Kerala, where the 23rd Party Congress of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) is set to begin on April 6.
  Strengthening the party at the national level to make it politically more relevant. That will be accorded top priority at the Congress. For that to happen, the party must regain the mass base and lost space in national political landscape. And all energies will be bent to attaining that prime (…)

• Is Leadership Change Possible in BSP? | S R Darapuri

  8 April 2022

  by S R Darapuri *
  The recent Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly election has once again exposed the continuing decline of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP). In this, the BSP has got only one seat and it has been badly wiped out while Mayawati claimed to form the government with an absolute majority. In this election, the vote percentage of BSP has come down from 22.3% in 2017 to 12.7% only. Its 19 seats in 2017 have been reduced to only one and that too the candidate has won on his own (…)

• Savarkar as a diehard Casteist: Evidence from Hindutva archives | Shamsul Islam

  8 April 2022, by Shamsul Islam

  The Savarkar rehabilitation project is taking newer forms. The latest attempt [‘How Savarkar fought for a casteless society’, The Indian Express, 28-02-2022] by the Savarkarites is to claim that “He had imagined a nation free of malevolent social evils such as caste cruelty, Untouchability, and injustice towards women. He advocated a casteless society based on notions of social justice coupled with social cohesion. He wanted to uproot the diversity of the caste system and build a nation (…)

• Chandigarh-dispute: Please handle with care | Prem Singh

  8 April 2022, by Prem Singh

  This comment is not about the history and politics related to the Chandigarh- dispute between the states of Punjab and Haryana that began in 1966. There was a statement by the Central Government through its Home Minister regarding the proposed changes in the administrative system of the Union Territory of Chandigarh. The journalists/analysts have stated that the Resolution once again passed in the Legislative Assembly to include Chandigarh in Punjab state was a ’counter-move’ of the Aam (…)

• BJP’s Electoral Ascendancy: Politics of Populism | Nayakara Veeresha

  8 April 2022, by Nayakara Veeresha

  by Nayakara Veeresha *
  Abstract
  The Bharatiya Janata Party (hereafter BJP) has returned to power in the recently concluded assembly elections in four out of five states. The political analysts and the post poll surveys have indicated that the BJP’s electoral mandate was given for the development, governance and welfare. No doubt, the policies of social welfare and target based programmes of the BJP have played a key role in grabbing the voter’s attention; however the point of concern (…)

• My 50 Years as an Independent Writer | Bharat Dogra

  8 April 2022, by Bharat Dogra

  I have just completed 50 years as an independent writer. This is no news for a world busy with big things, but democracy needs truly independent, unbiased journalists and in this context my experiences of five decades have some relevance.
  At the more obvious level, I could contribute about ten thousand articles/reports, and four hundred books and booklets in Hindi and English, apart from 70 short stories, two novellas and about a 100 poems and songs. I could maintain continuity in this (…)

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  Review of Brockmann, Sophie, The Science of Useful Nature in Central America

  8 April 2022

  Reviewed by Paul Ramirez (Northwestern University) __0__
  The Science of Useful Nature in Central America
  by Sophie Brockmann
  Cambridge University Press 2020. xii + 267 pp. $99.99 (cloth) ISBN 978-1-108-42123-2 __0__
  In 1772, the creole polymath José Antonio Alzate traveled outside of Mexico City to investigate the effects of a typhus outbreak. As he later reported in an issue of his literary journal, his reconnaissance included an interview with a “ladino” resident, who suggested (…)

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  Cartoon: The ever expanding definition of an anti-national | Hemant Morparia

  8 April 2022
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  A Book for Gautam Navlakha in Taloja jail - Illustration by Orijit Sen

  8 April 2022

  o o
  "The Bombay High Court on Monday, 4 April, labelled as "comical" the refusal by Taloja jail authorities to hand over a book by noted humourist PG Wodehouse to Elgar Parishad-accused Gautam Navlakha, citing a "security risk". [. . .]
  Read More at: Jail Denies [PJ] Wodehouse Book to Navlakha Citing ’Security’, HC Labels it ’Comical’ https://www.thequint.com/news/law/elgar-parishad-accused-gautam-navlakha-denied-book-jail-high-court-labels-it-comical