July 2009

Iranian politics is never easy to decode. The maelstrom around the June 12 presidential election intrigued most avid cryptographers scanning Iranian codes. So many false trails appeared that it became difficult to decipher who the real contenders were and what the political stakes were.
In the event, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei won a resounding victory. The grey cardinal of Iranian politics, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, has been dealt a crushing defeat. Is the curtain finally (…)

The Kangaroos have been behaving badly. Hopping mad, you might say.
This time not on the cricket field, but on the streets, and inside Indian homes and hostel rooms down under.
A number of Indian students studying at Aussie universities have been at the receiving end of hate-violence from young, vigilante gangs—all white and anglo-saxon.
They scream “you Indians, go home” and suchlike.
All very nastily racist, but racism strangely not directed at other than (…)

[gris]The following article was published in Seminar in June 1974. In view of its relevance at this juncture it is being reproduced with due acknowledgement and the permission of the author, the distinguished historian and Professor Emeritus, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.gris]
Marxism has been an active political and intellectual force in India for over 50 years now. One need not therefore apologise for an attempt to evaluate critically the record of the activities of the Indian (…)

Sometime ago, I was attending an interesting discussion on the subject of a national alternative. The discussion concentrated largely on the basic approach to the malaise of the present order, and was bereft of the excitement of a Rajiv-versus-V.P. Singh debate. Many distinguished scholars, political and social scientists participated and so did some political leaders.
One of the party leaders began his peroration with: ‘I am not an intellectual, I am a political activist.” Looking (…)

Book Review
High growth, Rising Inequalities, Worsening Poverty: India’s ‘Development’ Experience by Kamala Nayan Kabra; Books for Change; 2008; pp. 130; Rs 190.
The disconnect between high growth and poverty reduction in India is precisely because of a strong belief in official circles that growth itself can take care of the issues related to poverty and inequality. And the belief itself stems from a specific political economy of understanding and defining poverty. This is what Prof (…)

On April 29 this year the eight Arctic Council Ministers signed the Tromso Declaration, The Declaration is a guideline for the work in the Arctic Council in the next two years.
The Arctic Council has been meeting at the Foreign Ministers level every second year, approving projects and guidelines. However, due to the increased activity and interest in the Arctic, the Tromso meeting in Norway decided that the Council would henceforth meet at the political level once a year. (…)