Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• Why do we Need the Prevention of Communal Violence Bill?

  12 November 2013, by Ambrose Pinto

  If media reports are right, then the UPA Government is likely to table the Communal Violence Bill in the winter session of Parliament. There has been wide opposition to the Bill. The media has alleged that the Bill is for appeasement of minorities and a vote-catching device for the UPA in the elections of 2014. Even the Centrist forces have accused the UPA for planning to introduce the Bill just prior to the coming elections while the Congress party had promised to enact it in their (…)

• A Secular Offensive?

  12 November 2013, by Mukul Dube

  One reality that is clear to all is that the secular forces in India do not act: we only react. The other side lights fires and we rush to douse the flames. We leave the embers glowing, which makes it easy for the next fire to be lit. Having done what we can to repair the damage caused by the fire, we retreat to our seminar rooms and our writing desks: and there we stay until the next fire forces us off our backsides. We let loose torrents of words but accomplish little or nothing.
  To put (…)

• India’s Left and the 2014 Poll

  12 November 2013, by M K Bhadrakumar

  Sadly, it needed a bloody round of communal riots in Uttar Pradesh for the Left to see the ugly face of the Samajwadi Party [SP] Government in the State. The plain truth is that the SP has been playing communal politics in UP because it is bankrupt of ideas to project during the 2014 poll and has an “anti-incumbency” factor to overcome.
  In a recent statement the Polit-Bureau of the Communist Party of India-Marxist blamed the “role of the BJP and RSS in fomenting tensions”, but that is (…)

• A New Specimen of Corporate Politics

  12 November 2013, by Prem Singh

  The economy that serves the interests of Indian and foreign corporate houses can hope to exist permanently only if politics too adheres to the same goal. It is with this in view that the new economic policies implemented in the early 1990s have been focused to reinvent the mainstream political character as corporate savvy. No ideology or principle, other than corporate capitalism, seems to be working in the current scenario. Surely, the ideology of corporate capitalism has taken communalism, (…)

• Observing N.C.’s Birth Centenary in New Delhi

  12 November 2013

  Nikhil Chakravartty’s birth centenary (November 3, 1913-November 3, 2013) was befittingly observed in New Delhi. November 3 this year being Diwali, on November 2 the Editors Guild of India and Nikhil Chakravartty Memorial Foundation in collaboration with the India International Centre held a panel discussion on “Nikhil Chakravartty’s Journalism and Media Scene Today”.
  Speaking at the meeting, veteran journalist B.G. Verghese called for regulation of the press. In his view, “Media does (…)

• N.C.’s Abiding Relevance

  1 November 2013

  Political Notebook
  The national and international situation has undergone a sea change in the last half-a-century when Nikhil Chakravartty and his small but committed group of colleagues brought out Mainstream. Jawaharlal Nehru was alive and the non-aligned movement under the leadership of Nehru, Nasser and Tito sought to unify the underdeveloped and developing countries that were called the Third World. They followed the policy of non-alignment which meant that the Third World countries (…)

• N.C.’s Bio-Sketch

  1 November 2013

  On the occasion of the birth centenary of Nikhil Chakravartty (November 3, 2013) we present here his bio-sketch.
  Born on November 3, 1913 in Silchar (now in Assam) Nikhil Chakravartty had his school education at Hindu School, Calcutta (1925-29), and college education in Presidency College, Calcutta (1929-35). He graduated with History Honours in 1933 and stood First Class in MA (History) in 1935. Thereafter he went to Oxford where he studied in Merton College (1936-39) and in Oxford (…)

• Dada Chakravartty

  1 November 2013, by P.B. Sawant

  Dada Chakravartty belonged to a generation which valued both personal qualities and intellectual calibre. His times were also turbulent and tested the journalist’s moral fibre and intellectual integrity. Only those like him, who had firm convictions and clear insight and vision, could weather the storms. When he launched the Mainstream single-handedly, all his qualities were taxed beyond measure. Dauntlessly he stood like a rock never wavering for a moment. His upright, no-nonsense, gushing (…)

• Nikhilda: Some Nostalgic Reflections

  1 November 2013, by P.V. Narasimha Rao

  Former Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao was to have released the book India-Pakistan: Themes Beyond Borders—Selections from Nikhil Chakravartty’s Writings (published by Konark Publishers Pvt. Ltd.) at the meeting held in New Delhi on November 3, 2003 to mark N.C.’s ninetieth birth anniversary, but could not do so as he was indisposed. So he sent the following letter to the Mainstream editor and Secretary of the Nikhil Chakravartty Memorial Foundation, which was read out at the meeting.
  My (…)

• Nikhil — A Legend

  1 November 2013, by Kuldip Nayar

  The first time when I was introduced to Nikhil Chakravartty he was described as a Communist. This, however, turned out to be incorrect. No doubt, he was a Leftist but also a strong exponent of liberty and individual’s right which the communist ideology tends to minimise in the larger interest.
  I found Nikhil fighting against the regime during the Emergency, although the Communist Party of India (CPI) was an ardent of supporter of Mrs Indira Gandhi, the then Prime Minister, who had imposed (…)