2013

Afghanistan’s President, Hamid Karzai, is a man in a hurry. He has one year left in office and he cannot seek a third term. He wants to leave “a legacy of democracy” before he quits.
But he fears an onslaught from the Taliban, operating from across the border in Quetta once the NATO forces leave by the end of 2014.
They are backed by Pakistan. Indeed, the Taliban leadership is called the “Quetta Shoora”.
Battling detractors at home and critics in the West who are sustaining his (…)

The return of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to power in Pakistan after a hiatus of 14 years electrifies the regional politics of South Asia. Signals passing back and forth between New Delhi and Lahore underscore a subtle change having already appeared in the political vibes.
Typically, even as the results from the May 11, parliamentary poll were pouring in, Sharif told an Indian television channel on the following day: “I will visit India whether India invites me or not.”
Prime (…)

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 an accidental intrusion, innocently undertaken. Those who have (…)

The top leadership of the Congress party in Chhattisgarh came under a well-coordinated attack from the Maoists in Darbha Ghati in Sukma in the southern part of the Bastar region. The Congress leadership had been campaigning in the State as part of their ‘Parivartan Yatra’ as Chhattishgarh goes for polls during the year- end with several other States. Those who were killed are the Leader of the Opposition and a well-known Adivasi leader, Mahendra Karma, President of the Chhattishgarh Congress (…)

by B.K. Manish
While discussing the open invitation of the proposed Bastar Study Tour, which is an assertion by anthrophiles of visiting rights to a part of Dandakaranya, a virtually declared No-Go area by both the police and revolutionaries, two JNU professors postulated that the only hope of tribal autonomy is within revolutionary polity, and certainly not in bourgeois polity. Now this is a question which has perplexed at least two generations in the last thirty years so it could be (…)

With the UPA Government’s model of development, it is tragic and worrisome that any dissent is not only not allowed but even those who dissent are treated with vengeance and retaliation. The state seems to be saying that those not with it are against it. Those who oppose the neo-liberal model are considered as enemies of the nation. While red carpet welcome has been offered to multinational and trans-national corporations to loot and plunder resources of the country, those who oppose these (…)

IMPRESSIONS
In classical tragedy—Greek, Shakespearean or Indian—the underlying theory is that the tragic hero cannot help himself. Antigone and Hamlet knew they were drifting into suffering but were unable to avert tragedy. Duryodhana alone understood and explained the trap in which he was caught. He knew what was dharma, he said, “but I have no inclination to follow it.” The only inclination he had was to do whatever came to his mind at any given moment.
Even in their villainy the (…)

Taking exception to the CBI sharing its progress report on ‘Coalgate scam’ with the Law Minister and Joint Secretaries in the Prime Minister’s Office and Department of Coal, the Supreme Court characterised the CBI as “a caged parrot speaking its masters’ voice”—“one parrot with many masters”. The Court further observed that the CBI should have stood up to the pulls and pressures. The Court did not directly mention who it was that put the agency in the cage. The Court, in course of the (…)

by Mohd. Anzar Alam
Historical Background of Federation
In the context of Centre-State relations, an assessment of the federal structure of government in the Constitution is essential. In fact a federal structure is a design of government in which there is division of power on territorial basis between the Centre and States. This limits the concentration of power and authority in the hands of only one government as the country’s powers get divided between the Centre and States. Thus both (…)

BOOK REVIEW
by Sujata Madhok
Breaking Ground—Journey into the Media ... and Out by Rami Chhabra; National Book Trust; pp. 469; Rs 305.
A ringside view of the circus that is New Delhi, its circles of power and privilege and the mega changes it has witnessed in recent decades, marks Rami Chhabra’s 500-odd page magnum opus. This is both an insider and an outsider’s recollection of the challenges of professional and public life in post-independence India.
As a journalist and feminist who (…)