July 2009

Respected Prime Minister,
As Ganga and her numerous tributaries originate in the Uttarakhand Himalayas, this can rightly be called the maternal home of Ganga. We are two journalists who travelled in this region extensively for two weeks in June and were shocked to see the alarming extent to which the Ganga and its numerous tributaries/sub-tributaries are being ravaged and threatened by the indiscriminate, hasty, ill-planned, ruthless and in several cases illegal execution of hydel (…)

Mehtab Ali Shah, who teaches in Sindh University, Karachi, has sent us the following piece that appeared recently as a Letter to the Editor in Dawn, the well-known Pakistani daily. We are reproducing it for the benefit of our readers who should know that the strength of the friends of India among democrats in our neighbouring country is not inconsequential.
This refers to your editorial on June 26 in which you have rightly and passionately pleaded to the President to grant clemency to (…)

What has happened to this great country where men and women fought with bare hands to shake off the shackles of a mighty imperial power? The decisive weapon in the nation’s struggle for freedom was the massive strength of its awakened millions set in motion by leaders who could bestir them to go out and meet the adversary. Where has that ultimate weapon been lost?
Today when the very unity of the nation is threatened, a creeping paralysis seems to have gripped those who are expected (…)

It was when Muhammad Yunus won the Nobel Prize for Peace in 2006, that ‘Micro Credit’ hit the headlines of the media. Poverty alleviation became the buzzword. A wave of euphoria for micro credit swept the public mind. Micro Credit resembled the magical Aladin Lamp! It seemed, the darkness of poverty would disappear as soon as the lamp was lit. The Christian supremo, Pope Benedict XVI, sent a message to a conference at the Vatican blessing the micro-credit programme for promoting “a culture (…)

Death, we know, is a great leveller. What we do not realise is that it is also a great revealer. It strips off the many masks we wear in life and reveals the many truths we hope to hide. How glittering were the masks Michael Jackson sported! And how ugly the truths behind them!
The fans of course are uninterested in the ugliness. They remain dazzled by the magic of the Pop Emperor’s music. It was indeed superior music. It may have lacked the intellectual vigour of the Beatles, but it (…)

On the eve of Parliament’s Budget session the Union Cabinet decided to enhance the price of petrol by Rs 4 per litre and that of diesel by Rs 2 per litre while keeping the prices of cooking gas and kerosene unchanged. The decision, implemented from the midnight of July 1-2, was in response to the increase in the global price of crude oil. Officials, however, are of the view that state-owned oil companies would continue to suffer losses even after this hike. Hence there is every possibility (…)

It’s incredible but true. In their hour of defeat sworn enemies, the BJP and CPM, act like identical twins. Both make much noise about introspection and analysis. Yet both refuse to face the facts that stare them in the face. They play with self-serving justifications which fool no one but themselves.
The overwhelming difference between this election and every previous election is the change in the character of the electorate. Times have changed and people have changed for a variety (…)

According to a report in The Hindu of April 13 last, the Supreme Court headed by the Chief Justice issued three welcome directives to the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee while giving a verdict on a PIL petition filed by the Convenor of Gene Campaign, Ms Suman Sahai, an internationally famous Indian geneticist. The directives to the GEAC are that it must (i) consider the toxicity and allergencity of the proposed GM crop; (ii) study the requirement of isolation distance of the (…)

The Congress as the dominant partner of the UPA is back in saddle in New Delhi. It is being argued that there is a mandate for the new government to carry out some of what it wanted to do in its previous term but could not—privatisation or labour or insurance reforms. Has the public endorsed the UPA’s dominant economic agenda? Economic issues hardly came up in the election campaign because the Opposition lacked clarity on their importance.
The only economic issue that stirred the pot (…)

A nine-member fact finding team comprising students from New Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) and journalists recently visited Lalgarh, to probe into the reality of the ongoing movement of the people in the area. Here is a preliminary account of our observations. We would like to appeal to your publication to highlight certain issues of the movement which have so far been overlooked and neglected by the media.
We heard through various media and other sources that massive (…)