2010

The UP Zamindari Abolition Committee Report, which is supposed to be the most radical among such reports of other States where zamindari was abolished, was wholly opposed to any land redistribution despite the fact which it had noted that less than two per cent of the zamindars in UP owned nearly 58 per cent of the land. It had found that top 9000 zamindars owned above 100 acres of land each and that their Sir and Khudkast land alone constituted one-fourth of the agricultural land. Still the (…)

”It is our ardent desire that not even a single citizen of India should ever go hungry …. It is also our national resolve to root out malnutrition from our country,” said the Prime Minister in his speech on August 15, 2009. This reinforces the pro-poor mandate of the government based on expansion and deepening of the inclusive growth and programme the most dramatic promise made is the proposal to enact a National Food Security Act, which promises every family below poverty line (BPL) in (…)

These two versions are radically different in principle and content. The Preamble of our current Constitution has inscribed its conscience that it pledges the people of India to Justice—Social, Economic, Cultural and Political India with a geo-political concept. Indians are humanist—a socio-economic idea, a collective value, emphatically, a crore or more of Indian humanity with a cultural legacy. A finer noble thought than a mere span of space, a terrain or land politically united by a (…)

The time has come when we have to seriously ask ourselves if we are really serious about preserving in one piece this Republic of India. Many in our country think that to talk about disintegration of the Indian Union is just a fantasy with an overdose of panic. They can’t take it that we may have taken the road to Bosnia.
Three months ago, this impression was widespread. It can’t happen here—was the average Indian reaction when the mighty USSR fell apart without a whimper, and when (…)

A New Class of Politicians with their White Khadi Jibbas, Police Officers with their Well-starched Uniforms and Bureaucrats in their Neatly Tailored Gabardine Shutcoats together cheerfully Patronise Crime and Corruption in Modern India
Now all, including the political class, are up in arms against the retired Haryana Director General of Police, S.P.S. Rathore, for the crimes he committed nineteen years ago. He could not have gone scot-free then for the rape of a 14-year-old promising (…)

([rouge]Afghan Peace Prospects after London Conferencerouge]
[rouge]The following are two distinct viewpoints among the Indian strategic and foreign policy analysts on the peace prospects in Afghanistan following the London Conference, articulated of late in two different newspapers by two well-known experts on the subject. These are being reproduced, with due acknowledgement, for the benefit of our readers. —Editorrouge])
On January 28 the region took a ride in the raft of optimism to (…)

What US President Barack Obama’s adminis-tration has been pursuing in Afghanistan for the past one year has now received international imprimatur, thanks to the well-scripted London Conference. Four words sum up that strategy: surge, bribe and run. Obama has designed his twin troop surges not to militarily rout the Afghan Taliban but to strike a political deal with the enemy from a position of strength. Without a deal with Taliban commanders, the US cannot execute the ‘run’ part.
The (…)

The recent decision on the part of South Block to resume Indo-Pak talks, despite no visible signs from the side of Islamabad that it was taking tangible steps to dismantle the infrastructure of terror operating from within Pakistan and directed against India, has evoked mixed reactions in this country. The forces of subcontinental peace desiring friendship and amity with Pakistan have received a boost with this decision of the Indian Government; of course their position has always been (…)

Distinguished economist Kakkadan Nandanath Raj, 85, who contributed to the preparation of the First Five Year Plan (1951-56) at the age of 26 as an expert member of the Planning Commission, was the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Delhi and founded the Centre for Development Studies (CDS) in Kerala, passed away in Thiruvananthapuram on February 10. He had been keeping indifferent health for some time.
Dr Raj, like former President K.R. Narayanan (with whom he had a close bond as (…)

The following article on the present rise in prices of sugar has been written by Kobad Ghandy, the CPI (Maoist) leader now lodged in Ward No. 8 of Tihar Jail No. 3. Though suffering from prostrate cancer and incarcerated in prison he retains an alert mind as is reflected in the following article sent specially for publication in this journal.
At Rs 50 per kg sugar prices have never been so high. With sugar prices soaring, prices of all sugar linked products—sweets, mithais, tea etc.—have (…)