2013

COMMUNICATION
Grover Furr’s book, Khurshchev Lied: The Evidence That Every “Revelation

The situation in the Korean Peninsula has suddenly worsened due to a variiety of reasons wherein the US role behind the deterioration of the prevailing political environment cannot be minimised. A nuclear confrontation that could lead to global conflagration and annihilation stares us all in the face. Of course, Washington is unfazed and feels the North Korean posturing may not lead to anything in the ultimate analysis, that is, Pyongyang may eventually back off. Nevertheless, there is no (…)

by T.R. Krishnan
This article was written before the conclusion of the BRICS Summit at Durban. It is being published now as the validity of its contents remain undiminished till date. An analysis of the course of development of the BRICS grouping comprising Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa leads one to the distinct conclusion that this organisation is gradually evolving from a dialogue forum with consultative functions into a body endowed with a fullscale mechanism of (…)

by Sudhakar Vaddi
The Korean Peninsula has again become a volatile region and two recent incidents have sent a strong message to the international community that peace is at stake. Tension escalated after North Korea’s controversial rocket launch in December and its third underground nuclear test on February 12, 2013. Both acts led to the Security Council resolutions 2087 and 2094 which debarred the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) from testing or using nuclear or ballistic (…)

The post-Budget reactions to apprehensions on the tax residency certificate (TRC) expected from the foreign institutional investment (FII) or the foreign direct investment (FDI) proposals completely eclipsed the Finance Minister’s 22 per cent hike in the Central Plan outlays for agriculture and allied activities over the truncated 2012-13 revised estimates (RE). This is grossly unfair. There are, in fact, global concerns on the apparent business practices that erode the business base in (…)

by K.S. Chalam
Ever since the Whig Prime Minister Robert Walpole referred to the Budget opening the leather bag in British Parliament in 1733, the term became popular throughout the world about an annual financial exercise. The first Budget in our country was presented for seven- and-a-half months in November 1947. The Constitution has made special provisions for the presentation of the annual financial statement (Budget) in Parliament. It has under-gone far-reaching changes in the Budget (…)

One of the legacies of World War II is the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). During that War, a system of national income accounts was adopted to assess the production capacity available to support the War effort. The War ended in 1945 but the growth in the Gross Domestic Product has become an important indicator for policy-makers to assess national progress.
The GDP, a measure of the gross domestic product, is an index of the gross market value of a nation’s monetised transaction for goods (…)

by Asghar Ali Engineer
Until yesterday a woman was considered a man’s property after marriage and sexual gratification with her was considered his absolute right. She could not deny her husband this right whether she wanted or not. In the early eighties of the last century Sisters in Islam, a women’s organisation in Malaysia, sent me a query whether there is anything like the concept of ‘marital rape’ in Islam.
I went through all available traditional Islamic literature and found (…)

TRIBUTE
by Usha Ramanathan
We have to marvel at how the world has changed since r*** was a four letter word, and young Lotika Sarkar (1923-2013), the first woman lecturer in the Faculty of Law, University of Delhi, shocked the department by teaching rape to her students.
This is what happens when you let women into hallowed institutions of learning: they don’t understand that, even when they are allowed to be seen, they may not be heard about the obscene. This was our LS-given, early (…)

by Bijayalaxmi Nanda
Alarming reports in national and inter-national journals claim that over the last 30 years India has eliminated 30 million girls before their birth. These figures find their basis in the country’s decadal census reports. Approximately one million girls, who should have been born as per demographic calculations, are eliminated every year. In thirty years this figure stands at 30 million!
Census 2011 has recorded an all-time low in the child sex ratio (CSR) in India. (…)