Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• A False Dawn and a Long Dark Night in West Asia

  28 March 2011, by N A Karim

  That the sudden spurt of democratic spirit on a street of Tunis in Tunisia as a result of a rather bizarre incident of self-immolation of an IT trained fruit-seller youth who was publicly slapped by a woman police and its spread to the whole country compelled its President Zein-al -Abdeen Ben Ali ending his twentythree-year- long autocracy seemed too strange to believe. But it happened in the full gaze of the whole world. Not only that this new urge for democracy ended the highly corrupt (…)

• Illegitimacy of No-Fly-Zone against Libya: Reflections of the American World Order

  28 March 2011, by Arshi Khan

  The imposition of the ‘no-fly-zone’ against Libya under the UN Security Council Resolution 1973 on March 17 and subsequent unlawful aggressions by the US, UK and France for two days (March 19-20) seem to show the emerging trend of a new pattern of relationships and activities in international relations which the US desires, that is, of accepting a kind of ‘cowed conformity’ and ‘slavish submission’ by the states which had believed in pursuing independent foreign policies. This has been (…)

• Is Rajasthan Government Selling Farmers’ Interests?

  28 March 2011, by Bharat Dogra

  DEALS WITH MULTINATIONALS AND OTHER BIG AGRIBUSINESS COMPANIES
  A wide range of farmers’ organisations, Gandhian organisations, people’s movements and NGOs have united to oppose a series of disturbing agreements which the Rajasthan Government reached with various multinational and other agribusiness companies including Monsanto. These agreements, which greatly increase the control and influence of these companies over the agriculture sector in India’s biggest State (in terms of area), have (…)

• Black Money Criminals — Who will Catch the Big Fishes?

  28 March 2011, by A K Dasgupta

  Introduction
  The ghost of “Black Money” stashed in Swiss banks continues to haunt the Government of India. The recent disclosure that more than 100 Indians have deposited their ill-gotten money in these banks and the consequent uproar had forced the government to announce, on January 25, 2011, the appointment of a multi-disciplinary committee to look into the matter. However, the Finance Minister (FM) has refused to disclose the names citing legal problems entailing inter-national treaties (…)

• Miracles or Hoax by the Clergy?

  28 March 2011

  by Pushpa M. Bhargava
  In the Catholic Church, for anyone to be canonised, the person must have performed two miracles, a miracle being an action or an effect which can be explained only by direct intervention of a divine power that can defy all reason and laws of science. So we now hear of the late Pope John Paul II being canonised as he is believed to have cured a woman of Parkinson’s Disease.
  This is reminiscent of two miracles said to have been performed, in retrospect, by Mother (…)

• West Bengal: The Genocidal State under CPI-M Rule

  28 March 2011, by D. Bandyopadhyay

  Tt was reported in the print media that under the CPI-M rule of the last 34 years in this State (West Bengal) 34 events of mass murder were organised either directly by the police resorting to wanton firing on the crowds consisting of Opposition party members or by the armed “harmads” of the CPI-M to seek political revenge or to establish political control over the areas lost to the Opposition party through elections. In the latter incidents the police force aided, abetted and assisted the (…)

• Food Deficit in Kerala: Exploring the Possibility of NREGS

  28 March 2011

  by A.D. Manikandan
  Kerala has a long history of foodgrains deficit, especially in rice. For instance, deficit in rice has increased steadily in the State from 45 per cent to 85 per cent between 1957 and 2008. However, not enough attention has been paid to mitigate the food insecurity problem in the State in the context where there has been a large scale decline in the area and production of paddy. This paper gives a theoretical analysis on the application of the NREGS in the agricultural (…)

• Central Budget 2011-12 in the Context of the Rural Sector

  28 March 2011, by Kripa Shankar

  The revenue receipt of the Union Government for 2011-12 is estimated at Rs 7.9 lakh crores and net borrowing at Rs 4.1 lakh crores. The Central Plan outlay is estimated at Rs 5.9 lakh crores. In other words, borrow funds account for 52 per cent of the total receipts and finances 70 per cent of the Plan outlay. If the government depends on borrowings to finance the bulk of the Plan outlay there will be serious limitations in raising the quantum of expenditure on various develop-ment heads. (…)

• Coalition Politics and Good Governance

  28 March 2011, by Indrajeet Singh

  Recently the Prime Minister said that corruption was a by-product of coalition politics. This raises the following questions: does corruption take place only under coalition politics? Was corruption absent earlier when there was dominance of the Congress? There were dishonest actions under the governments of Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi. Then why has a person like Manmohan Singh made such a reckless statement? It is an open declaration against those classes which are marginalised (…)

• Why the Left Matters

  28 March 2011, by Prabhat Patnaik

  The following article, by one of the CPI-M’s intellectual pillars, appeared in The Indian Express (March 17, 2011). We are reproducing it with due acknowledgement alongwith a reply by a noted Left-wing journalist and writer who has sent it for publication in Mainstream.
  India has witnessed a veritable social transfor-mation in the 20th century. A society characterised for millennia by institutionalised inequality in its most grotesque forms, like “untouchability” and “unseeability”, has (…)