Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• Towards Global Isolation: A Word of Caution

  6 March 2013

  by V.C. Bhutani
  We in India need to call things by their proper names, not sparing the US or Pakistan and not bending over backwards to be nice to China. It is reasonable to assume that the US needs Pakistan in order to complete the ISAF withdrawal by the end of 2014. The end of 2014 is not so very far off. In two years we shall see the ISAF out of Afghanistan altogether. Thereafter the US shall not need Pakistan. Will the US then, in January 2015, make a determination that Pakistan is a (…)

• When the State abets Communalism, Independence itself is in Danger

  6 March 2013, by T J S George

  IMPRESSIONS
  The soul of modern India is its liberal democracy. Are we in danger of losing it? Communal posturings are getting ever more blatant. Caste leaders are defying the law openly. Intolerance is flaunted as a badge of honour. The government is a bystander, its inaction amounting to abetment.
  We won’t be alone if we turn democracy into a mockery. Sukarno, the hero of Indonesia’s freedom struggle, became a demagogue when he got power and proclaimed what he called “guided (…)

• Real Meaning of Shahbag

  26 February 2013, by SC

  With ‘choppergate’—that is, the Rs 350-crore kickbacks allegedly involved in the Rs 3546-crore contract for the purchase of 12 VVIP Augusta-Westland helicopters from the Italian aerospace and defence giant Finmeccanica—assuming a disproportionately large dimension with every passing day, Defence Minister A.K. Antony has moved fast to cancel the deal thereby causing much consternation among his Cabinet colleagues.
  In this setting the Budget session of Parliament has opened today and the (…)

• They

  26 February 2013

  February 21 is the International Mother Tongue Day as declared by the United Nations in recognition of the martyrs of the language movement who fell to the Pakistani police’s bullets on that day in 1952 in Dhaka while demanding that their mother tongue, Bangla, be made the official language of East Pakistan. This year February 21 has assumed added significance because of the massive youth mobilisation at Shahbag intersection in Dhaka calling for death to the criminals responsible for the (…)

• Shahbag Square — Why We, Pakistanis, Don’t Know and Don’t Care

  26 February 2013

  by Pervez Hoodbhoy
  Shahbag Square—where’s that? Abdul Kader Mullah—who’s he? A bunch of university students in Islamabad, with whom I was informally conversing yesterday (February 15), hadn’t heard of either. Of course, they knew of Tahrir Square and Afzal Guru’s recent execution. But they showed little interest upon learning that Shahbag Square was in Dhaka and that, as we spoke, the city was seething with protest. Between 100,000 to 500,000 Bengalis had converged to Shahbag to sing (…)

• Shahbag Square Will Haunt Us

  26 February 2013

  by Yaqoob Khan Bangash
  On February 16, Professor Pervez Hoodbhoy pointed out in an article, in this newspaper, that some students he was speaking to did not know about Shahbag Square. Coincidentally, when I asked my students the same question a few days ago, I got the same blank looks. The ques-tion, of course, is, first, why is our media not covering the events in Dhaka, but more impor-tantly, why, even after knowing about the event, we still do not care and don’t want to care.
  Our (…)

• Budget, Fiscal Deficit and Expectations

  26 February 2013, by Anshuman Gupta

  Budget time is very significant for an economy. It gives an opportunity to take stock of how the economy fared during the previous year and setting targets for the coming year. These targets are fixed on the basis of expectations or assump-tions of certain variables. The proficiency of the government is reflected on how accurately it makes the expectations of these variables. More often than not, the government is tempted to give a very rosy picture about the coming fiscal year by presenting (…)

• India-France Relations: Tremendous Scope Ahead

  26 February 2013, by Bharti Chhibber

  The recent visit of the new French President, Francois Hollande, to India can be seen as an important stepping-stone in developing an enduring and close partnership. It may not have resulted in inking the much-talked-about Rafale jet deal (the sale of 126 Rafale combat aircraft to the Indian Air Force), which is being negotiated since January 2012, but the fact that this was President Hollande’s first visit to a large Asian democracy and he chose India over Brazil, Russia and South Africa (…)

• Scandalous

  26 February 2013, by Nikhil Chakravartty

  From N.C.’s Writings
  The Bofors kickback scandal is fast assuming the dimension of a serious crisis for the Rajiv Government. For this, the Prime Minister has to a large measure hold himself and the bunch of cronies and hangers-on—whom he has been keeping under his tattered wings—responsible.
  The latest to bring discredit for him is the dishonourable conduct of the Joint Parlia-mentary Committee (JPC) which was set up to investigate into the identity of those who got the bribe money of (…)

• Afzal’s Hanging and its Aftermath

  26 February 2013, by Kuldip Nayar

  I was at the Parliament House when it was attacked in December 2001. Members like me were furious over the incident and the first suspicion was on Pakistan. It turned out to be true because the three who escaped were from Pakistan. Afzal Guru was from Kashmir and hence the same mix-up of Kashmir with Pakistan.
  How to sort out the Kashmir problem or, more so, why it has been held hanging thus far are questions which need to be answered by the rulers, both at Srinagar and New Delhi. State (…)