Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• Protest against Mob Lynchings and the Role of Civil Society in Breaking the Silence

  22 July 2017

  by Aurobindo Ghose
  A fifteen-year old boy was lynched to death in a train by a mob, when he was returning home with his relatives, on the evening of Thursday, June 22, after doing his Eid shopping in Delhi. The mob threw his body at Asaoti railway station near Faridabad. The boy’s name was Junaid Khan.
  There have been more than a dozen cases of lynching of Muslim men across India since Narendra Modi came to power, particularly since September 28, 2015 when a mob lynched 50-year old (…)

• Did Ambedkar Appreciate Puri’s Jagannath?

  22 July 2017, by A K Biswas

  The Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi’s address to the countrymen styled as ‘Mann ki Baat’ broadcast at 11:28 IST by the All India Radio on June 25, 2017 noted that:
  “Those who have studied Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar should have seen that Lord Jagannath Ji’s temple and his traditions were very much appreciated, because it contained social justice, social harmony. Lord Jagannath is the God of the poor.”1
  The history of Puri’s Jagannath temple totally precludes any room for Dr Ambedkar to (…)

• In Defence of Prof G.N. Saibaba: Letter to Ram Lal Anand College Governing Body

  22 July 2017

  To
  The Chairperson, Governing Body, Ram Lal Anand College,
  University of Delhi
  June 14, 2017
  Subject: Appeal against disciplinary action and termination of services of Professor GN Saibaba
  Dear Sir,
  We, the undersigned, current and past teachers of various universities in India and abroad, are writing to draw your attention to the alarming situation concerning one of our colleagues and fellow teacher, Dr G.N. Saibaba (Assistant Professor of English, Ram LalAnand College, (…)

• Against the Concept of Kashmiriyat

  22 July 2017, by Humra Quraishi

  MUSINGS
  The attack on Amarnath yatra pilgrims, killing seven (the figure has since risen to eight) and injuring several, is not just extremely tragic and shocking, but totally against the very concept of Kashmiriyat. Its hard, if not impossible, to believe that any Kashmiri could have carried out such a horrifying attack on the pilgrims. In my near 30-year-long association with the Valley Kashmiris (right from 1990), I haven’t come across a single Kashmiri who had a word to say against the (…)

• Majoritarian Will vis-à-vis Constitutional Supremacy

  22 July 2017

  by Vijay Kumar
  The happenings of the past few weeks, particularly indiscriminate ban on slaughter-houses and formation of anti-Romeo squads, ostensibly for insulating the young girls from eve-teasing but, in reality, unleashing crusade against love-Jihad after the formation of the new Government in Uttar Pradesh in the wake of an unprecedented mandate and menacing rise of cow vigilantism, have brought to the fore the inherent tension between the rule of the majority, on the one hand, and (…)

• Russia, Belt and Road, and the ‘Big Picture’

  22 July 2017, by M K Bhadrakumar

  The following article was written sometime back but could not be used earlier due to unavoidable reasons.
  Russia has not been a significant beneficiary so far of the Chinese honeypot known as the Belt and Road Initiative—although there is vast untapped potential to attract Chinese invest-ments into Russia’s infrastructure and industry. Yet, no sooner than the invitations went out for the BRI Forum summit in Beijing (May 14-15), word came that President Vladimir Putin looked forward to (…)

• MGNREGA Workers Need and Deserve Better Wages

  22 July 2017, by Bharat Dogra

  The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) was enacted to ensure economic security to those most deprived of it by providing them a guarantee of employment close to their home. However, the real life experience of many workers, who have toiled at these work sites, is that due to low wage rate as well as frequent delays in wage payment this security is often denied to them.
  The NREGA Sangharsh Morcha is a national level platform of people’s organisations, trade (…)

• Hotting up with China?

  22 July 2017

  From N.C.’s Writings
  Once again China has appeared on the radar screen of Indian security. Although officially the Indian authorities have so far denied any knowledge of Chinese troop concentration all along the far-flung frontier, the fact that for over two weeks now a Chinese patrol has dug in at about seven kilometres within the Indian territory at a strategic point in the Arunachal Pradesh, can hardly be dismissed as just as accidental intrusion, innocently undertaken. Those who have (…)

• Three Deaths — More than a Personal Loss

  22 July 2017

  TRIBUTE
  by Prabhat Patnaik
  When one reaches a certain age, one has to steel oneself to the idea of hearing periodically the news of one’s friends passing away. But when the passing of several friends gets concentrated within a very short span of time—each of them a brilliant person whose loss the country, not just one personally, can ill-afford—and when their deaths, by modern-day standards, are premature, then such news becomes difficult to bear. Three such outstanding individuals (…)

• Time to Resurrect Shekhon: An Eminent Air Warrior of Yesteryears

  22 July 2017

  by D.C. Bakshi
  Tolstoyan Foreshortening is a ‘perspective’ in which an individual recedes behind the accidents of history or the forces of society; his image getting restricted to the ‘episodic’.
  General Omar Bardley’s famous words on quality thrusts for the profession of arms, continue to be the keystone for professional armies throughout the world. He warned:
  “Inferior inducements bring second-rate men; second-rate men bring second-rate security. In war, there are no prizes for (…)