Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• Manufactured Certainty: When Absolute Logic Serves Capital | K. Sahadevan

  25 August, by K. Sahadevan

  When we evaluate complex systems such as biological systems through the lens of absolute logic and general scientific principles, we often lose sight of the intricate interconnections that sustain them. By focusing exclusively on isolated components rather than on the systems that emerge from their interactions, official institutions propose solutions that fail to grasp the whole. Popular movements gain relevance precisely by recognizing that this approach is no accident: such “scientific” (…)

• The Tyranny of Outcomes: Bureaucracy, Productivity, and the Crisis of Meaning | Yavor Tarinski

  25 August

  04 May 2026
  One may well ask oneself if there exists a single sphere of public or private life where the very spring-heads of activity and of hope have not been poisoned by the conditions under which we live. —Simone Weil[1]
  In capitalist societies what matters most is the outcome. Some speak of Cult of Productivity, others of Achievement Society, but the core beneath the various names used is the same — a deeply bureaucratic logic that aims at classifying, measuring, and (…)

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  AITUC Statement on the Supreme Court’s Jai Bir Singh Judgment | Aug 21, 2026

  25 August

  All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC)
  Press Statement:
  21st August 2026
  Supreme Court’s Jai Bir Singh Judgment: Concerns of labour shall Not Be Buried Under Judicial Reformulation
  All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC) takes serious note of the Constitution Bench judgment of the Supreme Court in State of U.P. v. Jai Bir Singh concerning the definition of “industry” under the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947.
  While the majority has retained (…)

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  Letter to the President of India - Request to return the MMDR bill 2026 to parliament for reconsideration

  25 August

  Loktantrik Rashtranirman Abhiyan
  Smt. Draupadi Murmu H. E. the President of India New Delhi
  Sub: Request to return the MMDR bill 2026 to parliament for reconsideration.
  Esteemed Madam,
  Loktantrik Rashtranirman Abhiyan requests Your Excellency to return to the Parliament for reconsideration the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Amendment Act, 2026, which is now awaiting your assent.
  It is extremely harmful to the federal structure of our polity as envisioned in the (…)

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  How Erdogan Turned Turkey into a Fiefdom | M.R. Narayan Swamy

  25 August, by M R Narayan Swamy

  BOOK REVIEW From Life Itself Turkey and Istanbul in the Age of Erdogan
  by Suzy Hansen
  Profile Books When you read a political biography of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, you feel you are discovering modern-day dictators around the world. It is not a surprise that he once boasted: “Now there are only two experienced leaders in the world. They are myself and Vladimir Putin.”
  American journalist Suzy Hansen also puts Erdogan in the same bracket as Narendra Modi and Xi Jinping – men who insist on (…)

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  Music: Duke Ellington and His Orchestra, Bombay, India, 1963

  25 August

  Play
  Duke Ellington and His Orchestra, Bombay, India, 1963 | Music Diplomacy Archives by U.S. Department of State https://youtu.be/j2PHiNA1ziw?si=DqzTIdNPDsKQiL_u

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  Video: John Berger "The Benjamin’s theories: Art in Mechanical Reproduction" Ways of Seeing, Episode 1 (1972)

  25 August

• Targeting Muslim Protesters as Anti-Nationals | Arup Kumar Sen

  15 August, by Arup Kumar Sen

  Othering of Muslims is a recurring strategy pursued by Hindutva politics in contemporary India. This was manifested in the recent protests in Kolkata against police atrocities on the students/young protesters in New Delhi. It was reported in Altnews: “From the assembly to press briefings, Suvendu Adhikari repeatedly invoked communal tropes while defending the arrests made over the alleged violence during the July 24 Kolkata solidarity protest. Sixteen people arrested in the case – 15 of them (…)

• Jai Hind | Faraz Ahmad

  15 August, by Faraz Ahmad

  We were little kids when our parents taught us the National Anthem by heart. That’s because every time the National Anthem was played on the Radio all of us stood up and recited it together, even within the confines of our little home.
  When Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru, the first Prime Minister of India whom we little children fondly called Chacha Nehru, addressed any public meeting, he would end it with raising the slogan ’Jai Hind’ three times and we kids screamed out loudly with enthusiasm (…)

• Jantar Mantar Notes —Togetherness during protests forging a bond for the future | Radhakanta Barik

  15 August, by Radhakanta Barik

  What happened to the crowd in Jantar Mantar? There were different groups from Ambedkarites to liberals and Marxists, but all lived in a small place in the rain and in a hot day and night without a fan except a hand fan. Visiting the place, one felt that there were another group sitting on dais popularly known as CJP leaders and in the evening, Sonam, while on hunger strike, gave a small talk for ten minutes, where he praised Modi, which disappointed me, but for his sacrifice as a hunger (…)