2013

From N.C.’s Writings
The remembrance of the day when the sun set on the British Raj in this land of ours is more than a mere ritual to be gone through year after year. No doubt it is the day when one feels proud of being a son or daughter of India, proud of having been part and parcel of that vast concourse of humanity that forced the alien ruler out and unfurled the flag of freedom over this country which used to be described even in the British-prescribed textbooks as the epitome of the (…)

Partition of the Indian subcontinent is 66 years’ old. On August 14, 1947, the states of India and Pakistan came into being in the wake of division. Even today they have not settled down as neighbours, much less as friends. Borders are bristling with troops and clashes are inevitable. A few days ago, five men from the Indian Army were killed. The Pakistan Army may not be directly involved. But it helps the jihadis and even the Taliban in their plan to destablise India. It appears the (…)

by N.V.K. Murthy
The country will soon be celebrating the 66th anniversary of its freedom. Much has happened since India became independent. Great strides have been made in the realm of industrialisation of the country. India has leap-frogged into the 21st century in certain areas like information technology. But let us accept that much more has to be achieved. Poverty, unemployment, sickness, droughts and floods stalk the country.
When the founding fathers framed a Constitution for our (…)

Introduction: The Current Situation
The economic growth rate has been falling continuously while the consumer price inflation, current account deficit in the external sector and fiscal deficit in the Budget remain at high levels. The lack of confidence in the Indian economy is manifested by the sudden and sharp decline in the value of the rupee vis-a-vis the dollar in spite of the steps taken by the government and the Reserve Bank of India. The stock markets are also fluctuating wildly (…)

by S. Sudhakar Reddy
The decision on Telangana’s Statehood by the core committee of the UPA-II and Congress Working Committee has became a controversy in some circles. The CPI, BJP, NCP, BSP, and naturally Congress at the national level supported it, while the CPI-M, SP opposed it. As expected, the Gorkhaland and Bodoland separatist agitations intensified to pressurise the Union Government following the decision on Telangana. There are festivities in Telangana and angry agitations against (…)

When Dr Manmohan Singh ascends the ramparts of the iconic Red Fort on August 15, 2013 to unfurl the national flag on the 67th Independence Day of the country, he would be announcing the creation of the Telangana State, the twentyninth of the Indian Union in the 57 years of reorganising the internal map of India. The significance of the event does not merely lie in another bifurcation or creation of another State, its significance is in several emerging sub-texts of Indian politics since the (…)

IMPRESSIONS
The usual doublespeak accompanied the Congress party’s green signal to Telangana. The party’s entire rank-and-file in Andhra was “solidly behind the decision”, they said. The decision was not politically motivated, they said. The truth is exactly the opposite. The State’s Congress Chief Minister and five Telugu Ministers in the Union Cabinet were solidly against the party’s decision and several MLAs have resigned. And the party was motivated entirely by political (…)

Telangana is set to become the 29th State of India. After much dilly-dallying the Congress Party finally approved the formation of Telangana State but before that there was a lot of heart-burn among the people. New ideas were floated for inclusion of Ananthpur and Kurnool into the new State against the wishes of the Telangana people. The biggest issue was Hyderabad where a lot of conspiracy theories were working such as declaration of joint capital or Union Territory. However, it is good (…)

by Saumitra Mohan
The recent cloudburst in Uttarakhand and subsequent natural disaster in the form of massive inundation should make many of us sit up and take notice. It is true that notwithstanding all disaster management plans, man is helpless against the vagaries of nature as also borne out by the regular loss of lives and property from tsunami, tornados, typhoons and hurricanes in developed countries like the USA and Japan. However, we can definitely be better prepared to face any (…)

BOOK REVIEW
by Yogesh Puri
Gopinath Bardoloi, “The Assam Problem” and Nehru’s Centre by Nirode K. Barooah; Bhabani Print and Publications, Guwahati; 2010; pp. 675.
“...The subject I have touched in this book and the material used for the purpose are still largely untouched and unknown….No one else has cared to study Bardoloi in such depth as the present author.” (p. ix) Indeed, this is not a tall or boastful claim by the author. The claim is convincingly vindicated by his (…)