Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• In the Name of Ram

  12 December 2010, by Nikhil Chakravartty

  FROM N.C.’S WRITINGS
  [The following piece, which appeared within a fortnight of the demolition of the Babri Masjid (December 6, 1992), is being reproduced on the eighteenth anniversary of that infamous event.]
  To build a temple to mark the brithplace of Ram, a mosque was destroyed by deceit.
  Those who swiftly and competently did the demolition job on Sunday (December 6, 1992), did so before the very eyes of those leaders who had been assuring Parliament and the public that the (…)

• An Enduring Loss to the Sharqi Tradition

  12 December 2010, by Sankar Ray

  The Babri Masjid was one of the last masterpieces of what is known as the Sharqi school of architecture—different from the star-shaped temple Nagara style characterising the architectonics of Hindu temples. A former Director of the Archaeological Survey of India categorised the mosque as a specimen of Sharqi architecture which flourished decades before Babar arrived in India.
  Constructed from the end of the 14th century, when Jaunpur was the capital of the Sharqi kingdom, architectural (…)

• ’Fear of Accusation Cannot Justify Silence’

  12 December 2010

  by Anand Swaroop Verma
  If telling the truth is a crime then Arundhati Roy should be definitely penalised for what she said on Kashmir. I would like to quote a few paragraphs from the veteran journalist Ajit Bhattacharjea’s article ‘Reaping A Whirlwind In Kashmir’ which was published on August 22, 1990 in The Tribune (Chandigarh):
  When Pakistan Foreign Secretary Tanvir Ahmed Khan was in New Delhi for the second round of Indo-Pakistan talks, he based his case on excesses committed by our (…)

• Right to Education: Challenging Tasks Ahead

  12 December 2010

  Dr Kishore Singh (Ph.D in international law, Sorbonne, 1977) has been responsible for the Right to Education at UNESCO (1998-2009). He has been the Secretary of the Joint Expert Group, UNESCO (CR)/ECOSOC (CESCR) on the Monitoring of the Right to Education since its establishment in 2001, and has collaborated with the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), Geneva, and participated in the work of the United Nations human rights treaty bodies. He has also cooperated with (…)

• Principle versus Piecemeal Approach

  12 December 2010

  by Gautam Navlakha
  In order to understand the significance of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act and our response we must understand the role of the armed forces of the Union in wars of suppression. Because, we tend to overlook the magnitude of experience of the war. And yet, whether we choose to ignore the war or to pay hypocritical obeisance to the victims of the war, it does not obviate the reality of the war.
  It is my contention that our opposition to the AFSPA is not only because (…)

• Right to Education: Challenging Tasks Ahead

  12 December 2010

  Dr Kishore Singh (Ph.D in international law, Sorbonne, 1977) has been responsible for the Right to Education at UNESCO (1998-2009). He has been the Secretary of the Joint Expert Group, UNESCO (CR)/ECOSOC (CESCR) on the Monitoring of the Right to Education since its establishment in 2001, and has collaborated with the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), Geneva, and participated in the work of the United Nations human rights treaty bodies. He has also cooperated with (…)

• Open Letter to Our Dear Brothers in Pakistan

  12 December 2010, by Shree Shankar Sharan

  REMEMBERING MUMBAI 26/11
  On the second anniversary of the 26/11 terror attacks in Mumbai we remember the martyrs of those refarious assaults and reproduce the following piece that appeared in Mainstream (December 6, 2008) since it embodied one of the rare voices of sanity raised in this country following the 60-hour trauma India’s
  commercial capital had to experience from November 26 to 29, 2008.
  Our dear brothers in Pakistan,
  In the intense grief that I am in due to the mindless (…)

• Why is an Alternative Political Party Needed and What will be its Essentials?

  12 December 2010, by Bharat Dogra

  I would like to take forward the debate initiated by Sumanta Bannerjee’s letter to the national stage. Here I try to answer two basic questions:
  1. Why is an alternative political party needed when so many political parties already exist?
  2. What are the essential, non-negotiable characteristics of this alternative political party?
  Let me take up the first question first A genuinely alternative political party is needed not only in India but in most democracies as the main political (…)

• Niira Radia Tapes and the Stench

  12 December 2010

  MEDIA In the wake of the Niira Radia tapes, now in circulation due to the publication of their operative parts in the Open Magazine and Outlook, a series of commentaries on the role of the media and today’s journalists have appeared in the print media. One of the sharpest critiques of that role has been published in the Pakistani publication, Dawn. In view of the importance of the subject being discussed we are reproducing it, with due acknowledgement, for the benefit of our readers. Jawed (…)

• Glamour is not Credibility

  12 December 2010, by T J S George

  MEDIA
  Journalism started going astray with the birth of financial dailies in the 1960s. With full-fledged newspapers devoted exclusively to business, corporate houses became hyperactive. The next thing we knew was press conferences ending with gifts of expensive sarees and suitlengths to reporters.
  That was innocent child play compared to what has hit the headlines now—charges of celebrity journalists working hand in hand with a professional lobbyist to fix things like Cabinet (…)