Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• On Sarabjit’s Death, Chinese Intransigence

  4 May 2013, by SC

  As we go to press, the body of Sarabjit Singh, the Indian death-row convict who spent 22 years in a Pakistani prison before he was brutally injured in the Kot Lakhpat Jail six days ago on April 26 (he died late last night in Lahore’s Jinnah Hospital having succumbed to his grievolts injuries in the skull and brain in particular), has reached Amritsar by air after all the bureaucratic procedural delays and is due to be taken to his ancestral village for the last rites.
  The barbaric attack (…)

• Support Telangana State Demand

  4 May 2013

  Leader and activists of all parties advocating a separate State of Telangana held a two-day dharna at New Delhi’s Jantar Mantar on April 29 and 30, 2013 during the Parliament session to reiterate their demand for a Telangana State. The following document was distributed at the dharna. It is a statement from the Telangana Joint Action Committee. It is being reproduced here for the benefit of our readers.
  The Telangana people are struggling for a separate State for this region for about the (…)

• How Best to Exploit Arctic Resources in National Interest

  4 May 2013

  by M.N. Sharma
  According to foreign experts, Russian researchers have collected sufficient data through their probes to substantiate the boundaries of Russia’s continental shelf. Following a three-month-long geological-and-physical expedition Arctic-2012 to validate the outer boundaries of the Russian continental shelf, researchers gathered more than 22,000 rock samples from the floor of the Arctic Ocean. All these samples were found to be of local origin and not deposited by current. The (…)

• Shocking!

  4 May 2013, by Nikhil Chakravartty

  From N.C.’s Writings
  The gruesome killing of three—a girl and two young men—at Mehrana, a village near Mathura on the UP-Rajasthan border on March 27 has spread shock waves.
  The inhumanity of the lynching of the three on the order of the village panchayat brings out the grotesque dimension of the prevailing social inequity in our country. The original report said that the girl had eloped with one of the young men, while the other had helped them to go away. The girl belonged to a Jat (…)

• But for the Judges who Defend Fairness, Our Country would be Diminished

  4 May 2013, by T J S George

  IMPRESSIONS
  This piece was written before Justice J.S. Verma’s death last month. However, as it is of considerable relevance it is being published now.
  We don’t hear anything these days about Justice P.D. Dinakaran or Justice Soumitra Sen or Justice K.G. Balakrishnan.
  That is a relief. We do hear about Justice M.N. Venkatachaliah, Justice J.S. Verma, Justice K.T. Thomas, Justice Santosh Hegde and Justice Markandeya Katju. That is a reassurance. This is one league where The Good (…)

• Pak Scene Turning Increasingly Murkier

  4 May 2013, by Kuldip Nayar

  I have made nearly 200 trips, if not more, to Pakistan ever since I left Sialkot, my birthplace, way back in 1947 during partition. On each of my visits to that country, I have always admired the people’s forbearance and endurance despite several situations that had jinxed them since the country came into being 66 years ago. It has faced a long ordeal of difficulties with very little respite. Yet the people’s eyes have remained fixed on a democratic set-up that will not only give them (…)

• Chicago shows the Path

  4 May 2013

  by Vahidha Nizam
  May Day is the symbol of the struggle of the international proletariat for its emancipation. It is indissolubly bound up with the political significance of the working class’ demand for shorter workday. Although apparently the upsurge was in demand of eight-hour work and increased wages, in its content and idea the struggle was violently against the wickedly exploitative system of capitalism.
  It will be political naiveté to believe that the May Day Martyrs—August Spies, (…)

• The Significance of ‘May Day’ and India’s Response

  4 May 2013

  by Anil Kumar Mohapatra
  ‘Many meanings’ have been associated with the ‘First of May’ of which one that has received wide acceptance is that it reminds us of the importance of the ‘working class’ to our society. Therefore, in many countries, May 1 is observed as ‘May Day’ or ‘International Workers’ Day’. In many countries the day is an official government holiday marked by meetings and street demonstrations to highlight the cause of the working class.
  Its commemoration dates back to the (…)

• Dalit Representation in Bollywood

  4 May 2013, by Harish S. Wankhede

  The celebration of 100 years of Bollywood needs to be reviewed from a subaltern perspective. The general assumption that cinema is a normal mode to produce anecdotes to satisfy the entertainment quotient of the people should go through a critical scrutiny. Films as artistic expression cannot be devoid of their politico-ideological objectives. Hence, from a Dalit perspective when one enquires about their space during the past one century of the film world, only a handful of non-decrepit, (…)

• Rights and Survival of the Girl Child and the Role of Panchayats

  4 May 2013

  by Bidyut Mohanty and Bijayalaxmi Nanda
  Introduction
  In a patriarchal society like India, the dominant ideology has been to devalue women in economic, social or political institutions. The normative value systems give sanctions to such guiding principles through socialisation, rituals, narration of epics, etc. Within the categories of women, the girl child and women having only a girl child and widows get raw deals. The behaviour of parents/in-laws or other blood relatives indicate that (…)