Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• Interpreting FRA to Uphold Justice

  31 March 2019

  by Suranjita Ray
  On February 28, 2019, in response to a review petition filed by the governments both at the Centre and in Gujarat, the Supreme Court stayed its controversial order of February 13, 2019— to ensure eviction of nearly one million Adivasis and Other Forest Dwellers from forestlands, whose claims under the Scheduled Tribes and Other Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act 2006, have been rejected across several States.1
  The Apex Court, in its stay order, has asked (…)

• It’s the bureaucracy, stupid

  31 March 2019

  THE UTTERLY CRASS AND VULGAR SENSE OF BUREAUCRATIC HUMOUR IN WHAT WAS ONCE BEHIND THE IRON CURTAIN
  by Somdeb Lahiri
  On June 25, 2008 I boarded a flight from Delhi to attend the Second International Conference on Game Theory and Management that was held at the Graduate School of Management, Saint Petersburg State University, Russia on June 26-27, 2008. I changed flights at Helsinki and arrived at St. Petersburg’s Pulkovo airport by flight number AY 0165 the same day. It is very (…)

• The Pulwama Attack and its Fallout

  31 March 2019

  by Mahi Pal Singh
  The terrorist attack on a CRPF convoy at Pulwama in Jammu and Kashmir on February 14, in which forty personnel of the para-military force were killed, was a brutal, barbarous and cowardly act by an activist of Jaish-e-Muhammad, a Pakistan-based terrorist organisation, aided and abetted by the military and Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) of Pakistan; it needed and was rightly condemned throughout India by one and all as well as by the international community. The outrage (…)

• Rhetoric and Reality: How Development Issues will play out in Election Season

  31 March 2019, by Bharat Dogra

  While there is always the possibility of communal or jingoistic issues flaring up at the time of the election season in India, there is no doubt that development issues will also be an important factor. While the overall record of the NDA II Government in fulfilling its development promises has been highly inadequate, it is nevertheless trying to create an aura of great achievements and gains for the common people. The entire effort has been planned in such a way that just around election (…)

• What is Fundamentalism?

  31 March 2019, by Nikhil Chakravartty

  From N.C.’s Writings
  Fundamentalism has become a much-used term today—in politics and in the academia. And there are in vogue various types of the so-called fundamentalists—political, religious and cultural.
  But before cataloguing these various tribes of fundamentalists, it is important to clarify what precisely is meant by fundamentalism. The Oxford English Dictionary says the term, funda-mental, pertains to “the basis or groundwork, going to the root of the matter”. But the word (…)

• Prime Ministerial Candidate in a Parliamentary Democracy

  31 March 2019

  by Deeksha Gupta and Anubhav Bijalwan
  The practise of declaring the prime ministerial candidate by the political parties before the parliamentary elections is on the rise. The ruling party had declared Narendra Modi as its prime ministerial candidate in September 2013, much before the votes were polled for the 16th Lok Sabha elections in 2014. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had earlier declared senior leader L.K. Advani as its prime ministerial candidate for the 2009 Lok Sabha (…)

• Before terrorists, India has no friends; we are alone

  31 March 2019, by T J S George

  IMPRESSIONS
  Prime Minister Modi had and will continue to have, the backing of all of India in his stand against the terrorists who “made a big mistake” in attacking the jawans in Pulwama. The attack must have given the Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) and its protectors in Pakistan a cheap thrill of achievement as they managed to kill 40 CRPF men in one go. But it was a big mistake because it made India unite against the assassins. Enemies have been shown that they cannot take advantage of India’s (…)

• Grave Economic Crisis in Pakistan — Some Thoughts to Share

  31 March 2019

  by Gouri Sankar Nag and Arpan Bhattacharya
  Going by the recent socio-economic indicators, many scholars are now of the view that Pakistan, unless it mends its ways urgently, would soon be gripped by grave economic trouble. The fast depletion of foreign exchange reserves owing to the unbridled import bill and unsatisfactory exports coupled with the rising value of the US dollar against the Pakistani rupee might trigger a looming balance of payment crisis and compel Pakistan to go to the IMF (…)

• Gulnara Karimova: From Tashkent Presidential Palace to Uzbek Prison

  31 March 2019

  by R.G. Gidadhubli
  On March 9, 2019 the Uzbek judiciary announced punishment of imprisonment to Gulnara Karimova, elder daughter of late Islam Karimov, former President of Uzbekistan, for five years since she has repeatedly violated the Uzbek laws. This hit headlines in the country. Gulnara had the privilege of staying in the presidential palace of Tashkent since Islam Karimov was in power in Uzbekistan for about 27 years since 1989 as the last President of the former Soviet Socialist (…)

• Scholar Accessible: Rabindra Ray (1948-2019)

  31 March 2019

  TRIBUTE
  by Swatahsiddha Sarkar
  Least did I expect the person who kept on grilling me around a single point during my Ph.D entrance interview at the Delhi School of Economics (D’School hereafter) to become my supervisor and then a lot more. His persistent point of query during the interview—“are the Gorkhas a community?”—not only allowed me to think and argue with him there at the interview board but also made me realise during my lengthy Ph.D period that I was trying to find an answer to (…)