Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• Why Our Cities Flood

  30 August 2025

  When torrential rains turned roads into rivers in cities like Mumbai, Chennai, and Bengaluru once again in 2024, the images that emerged were sadly all too familiar: vehicles half-submerged, pedestrians wading through waist-deep water, and houses inundated in hours. These were not isolated incidents. In the same year, urban floods ravaged nations as far apart as Afghanistan, Indonesia, Kenya, the Democratic Republic of Congo, France, and Germany. The message is clear

• Cotton Import Tax cut will damage farmers interests | Soma Marla

  30 August 2025, by Soma S. Marla

  In Telangana, cotton is a major cultivated crop after paddy. The recent decision by Union government to waive 11 % import tax on raw cotton from foreign countries is further pushing market-distressed farmers. Decision on exemption of import duties on August 18th was taken to stabilise domestic cotton prices and support the recent tariff-stricken textile industry. But the reality is different. It depresses prices further markets pushing farmers in to further distress and indebtedness. Also, (…)

• Revisiting Manipur 27 months later | John Dayal

  30 August 2025, by John Dayal

  There are many victims in the 27-month ethnic conflict in Manipur; and most government institutions must own responsibility.
  The devastating conflagration engulfed the north-eastern state on May 3, 2023, triggered by a Manipur High Court directive recommending Scheduled Tribe (ST) status for the Meitei community, escalating ethnic tensions into widespread violence.
  With over 200 deaths, thousands displaced, and societal divides deepened, it is a national crisis testing India

• One Hundred Years of Solitude: A Tale of Insurgency and Counter-Insurgency | Arup Kumar Sen

  30 August 2025, by Arup Kumar Sen

  The path-breaking novel of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude, may carry diverse meanings in different geographical and cultural locations. Marquez situated this novel in the fictional town

• Solid Waste Management and Informal Women Waste Collectors at Bhalaswa landfill in Delhi | Sridhar, Ali, Patel, Kushbu

  30 August 2025

  by V.K.Sridhar*, Akbar Ali, Abhishek Patel, Kushbu, Nasreena Ibrahmin, Sweta, Deepti Singh, Vijeta
  Abstract
  Waste holds different meanings across societies, as traditional communities tend to use resources conservatively, while industrialization and a culture of productivity have fostered a

• The Everyday Violence of Time: A Structural Analysis of 12-Hour Workdays in Jodhpur

  30 August 2025

  Introduction: The Illusion of Time
  The concept of time, when abstracted, often represents opportunity, leisure, and self-actualisation. The 12-hour workday, however, transforms this conceptual luxury into a constraint - a structure of unfreedom for industrial labourers. In the steel industry [read sheet metalware units] of Jodhpur, Rajasthan, workers routinely toil for 12 hours a day, six to seven days a week. Rather than being a matter of choice or productivity, such extended work hours (…)

• On our National Anthem | Jayanta Kumar Ghosal

  30 August 2025

  Tagore has had an immense influence on the shaping of the modern Indian mind. Our National Freedom Movement also received strong moral sustenance from him. And he composed

• Gandhian Truth and Non-Violence | G. Javaid Rasool

  30 August 2025

  A truth questioning the authenticity of most truths, practiced with oneness of adoration as the eternal bedrock of material life and proclaimed as God, could only be the Truth Mahatma Gandhi experimented with.
  ?Gandhi Ji fashioned Truth as passion, as an impulse in his life. His Truth was free from the wanting of idolization, never willing to shroud it in mystery. Not ever sought a metaphysical explanation. Instead, simply worshiped Truth as Supreme Force, and practiced as a means for (…)

• Reactionaries and Scientific Mind in India | Bhabani Shankar Nayak

  30 August 2025

  It is the constitutional duty of every Indian citizen

• Lord Hanuman as First Space Traveler: Mythology as Science | Ram Puniyani

  30 August 2025, by Ram Puniyani

  Mythologies, all over the World, are very pleasant flights of imagination. While our childhood fascination with these is everlasting in our memories, the trend from the last few decades is that right-wing ruling parties