Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• Distance Education Under Threat

  12 August 2013

  by Sadhan Mukherjee
  Our national policy is to help educate India’s youth deprived of higher education but it begs to be fulfilled. The Distance Education (DE) mode is a way out, but it is currently under threat. Why?
  It cannot be overstated that shortsighted bureaucrats and vested interests are thwarting the DE efforts. There is hardly any public outcry as many people are still not aware of this form of education. If at all, they perceive it akin to a correspondence course (CC). The (…)

• Panchayat Polls: The Verdict of Rural Bengal

  12 August 2013, by Barun Das Gupta

  As expected, rural Bengal has given a massive mandate for the Trinamul Congress in the panchayat polls. The ruling party has captured 13 of the 17 Zilla Parishads, the Left Front one (Jalpaiguri) and the Congress one (Murshidabad). In two districts, Maldah and North Dinajpur, no party has won a clear majority. Compare this with the results of the previous (2008) polls and the sea-change will leap to your eyes: Left Front 13 Zilla Parishads, Congress two and TMC two. The table has now been (…)

• Negotiating Marginality: The Bangla-speakers of Assam

  12 August 2013

  by Nabanipa Bhattacharjee
  With the population close to 30 per cent as per the 2001 census and the provisional total of the 2011 census, the Bangla-speakers are the largest linguistic minority in Assam. A subs-tantial number of that, both Hindu and Muslim, is concentrated in southern Assam which is also popularly known by the epithet Barak Valley to represent the three districts of Cachar, Karimganj and Hailakandi. In addition to the Bangla-speakers, the Barak Valley is also home to other (…)

• Caste and Social Transformation in Indian Democratic Society: A Transitional Phase

  12 August 2013, by Indrajeet Singh

  ‘We must make our political democracy a social democracy as well. Political democracy cannot last unless there lies at the base of it social democracy. What does social democracy mean? It means a way of life which recognises liberty, equality and fraternity as the principles of life. [. . .] On the 26th of January 1950, we are going to enter into a life of contradictions. In politics we will have equality and in social and economic life we will have inequality. [...] We must remove this (…)

• Professor Malyarov As I Knew Him

  12 August 2013, by Arun Mohanty

  TRIBUTE
  Professor Oleg Vasilyevich Malyarov, the eminent Indologist and a multifaceted personality, unexpectedly passed away on the very day of Easter in his village house in Russia’s Novgorod district. In his demise while India lost a sincere friend, Russia lost a great patriot, a leading Marxist scholar, a brilliant economist and a valiant fighter for social justice. Malyarov, born in Vladivostok, had received his higher education from the prestigious Economics Faculty of the world (…)

• Keeping Out Dons

  12 August 2013

  by Arun Srivastava
  With political parties unwilling to clean their stables, the Supreme Court has stepped in to rid the much-maligned system, make life tough for the criminals in politics by ruling that those convicted in a criminal case will stand disqualified as a lawmaker from the date of conviction.
  Since 2002 the Apex Court has been expressing its concern and keen desire to end the menace of criminalisation of politics. But nothing substantial could be achieved so far. The political (…)

• Muslim Terrorism Against The Endless Crusades

  12 August 2013, by K G Somasekharan Nair

  Since the unknown past, Judaism has had four traditional castes, namely, Pharisees, Sadduces, Essenes and Zealots. Each claimed its purity, sanctity and supremacy over the other. Therefore, one among them did not recognise the other and arrived at a determination of intolerance: “one caste, one religion and one god for men”. In the Dark Age, St. Ambrose, St. Augustine and Pope Gregory derived a homily from their parental religion, Judaism: “one religion, one Church and one empire for the (…)

• Durga’s Suspension, TMC’s Feat, Telangana

  3 August 2013, by SC

  Two major developments have caught national attention over the last few days.
  First came the suspension of a young IAS officer of the UP cadre, Durga Shakti Nagpal, the Gautam Buddh Nagar SDM, ostensibly on the ground that she had pulled down the wall of a mosque being built without clearance (an act that triggered communal tension in the area, according to the UP CM), whereas the general impression is that action was initiated against her for having found “visibly tackling illegal sand (…)

• To Talk about Austerity...!

  3 August 2013, by Nikhil Chakravartty

  From N.C.’s Writings
  The air is thick with talk about the economic crisis facing the country. The Finance Minister has called it “a grave economic crisis”. “We have not experienced anything similar in the history of independent India,” he has said.
  In Parliament, in newspaper offices, in the university campus, in Chambers of Commerce, the talk centres round the urgent need to borrow, to contract loans so that our economy could be sustained and the nation does not collapse under debts. (…)

• Mr Sen

  3 August 2013, by Badri Raina

  Dear Mr Sen, here is what you forgot:
  When a party of traders gives,
  It expects. Thus, Bharat Ratna
  Was bestowed on you by us
  Not because we thought you
  Were great shakes—who bigger
  And better than Golwalker ever—
  But so that you might hide
  The better part of your wisdom
  About Bharat and its travails,
  And begin to speak from our side.
  Clearly, that Nobel—a Western conspiracy—
  Turned your Leftist head, and even
  At Harvard—Subramaniam Swamy’s
  Pride—you felt (…)