2015

WOMEN’S WORLD
‘Oh poor India!... How sad! The country, whose male population is unkind, unreligious and unaware of the distinction between good and evil and doesn’t care about justice and fairness and where abiding by rituals is the chief preoccupation of religion, should not give birth to girls!’ In the 19th century, noted social reformer Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar gave this lament. Have things changed much since then?
Last year I happened to spend a few hours at Dubai Airport. As I sat (…)

Keya Chakraborty (1942-1977) was a legendary actress on the Bengali stage in the late 1960s and 1970s. She died a mysterious death while shooting for a Bengali film, Jeevan Jey Rakam (Life as it is). She jumped into the Ganges from the boat in a particular scene and was washed away. The body was recovered with multiple injuries.
I did not have a chance to see Keya Chakra-borty’s acting. I saw her once as a school boy on the Annual Sports Day of Scottish Church College where she taught in (…)

From N.C.’s Writings
Human Rights Day is observed on December 10 every year commemorating the day, in 1948, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. To mark the occasion we are reproducing the following article N.C. wrote twentythree years ago.
The government’s decision to set up a National Human Rights Commission is a significant indication of its being able to read the signs of the times. The Prime Minister has made the eloquent claim about (…)

by S.C. Sharma
The following is a study based on the results of a field survey undertaken by the author for the Research Project “Impact of NREG Scheme on Rural Economy of Punjab: A Case Study of Three Districts“. The project was funded by the UGC, New Delhi.
Introduction
Numerous studies have been undertaken to assess the impact of the NREGA scheme on poverty, gender equity and asset creation among all the States having implemented the scheme including Punjab. The review of literature (…)

BOOK REVIEW
by Renji George Amballoor
Kerala Economy and its Emerging Issues by V. Mathew Kurien and Raju John; Sahitya Pravarthaka Co-operative Society Limited, Kottayam; 2014; pp. 400; Rs 350.
Kerala Economy and its Emerging Issues is a comprehensively edited book on the dynamics of the Kerala economy in the post neo-classical era by Dr V Mathew Kurien and Raju John. The book provides the readers with in-depth insights on the emerging economic dynamics of Kerala. The editors have (…)

by Ayaz Ahmad
The heated debate on so-called intolerance and Award Wapsi keeps throwing up an obvious question, why now? What has happened after the ascent of the BJP/RSS to power at the Centre and in some States since 2014 to cause such widespread alarm in the citizenry? One explanation is that those protesting against the growing atmosphere of intolerance in the country are inherently opposed to the idea of the BJP/RSS and Modi in power. But for once, an explanation can be suggested by (…)

by Hasan Hamidullah
By now it is getting increasingly clear by the day that the Turkish Government of President Recip Tayyap Erodogan is doing everything possible to help the Islamic State in every way thereby exposing the double-standards of a key member of the NATO military grouping that is pledged to fight the IS tooth and nail, especially after the deadly arrest attacks in Paris master-minded by the IS.
Recently Turkish intelligence chief Hakan Fiden made a startling statement. On (…)

political notebook
The Babri Masjid at Ayodhya was demolished on December 6, 1992. The forces that demolished the historic mosque have become far stronger today and are threatening to demolish the entire edifice of India’s secular and democratic polity. The insecurity that the members of the minority community felt at that time has grown manifold. There is a pervasive fear among them. Witness the cold-blooded lynching of Mohammed Akhlaq of Bisada village near Dadri in UP in late September (…)

by Sharat Poornima
“The Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s needs but not every man’s greed.”
—Mahatma Gandhi
The idea of environmental conservation was built into India’s traditional culture. The ancient dictum in India “tyakten Bhunjitha” (concept of consumption along with sacrifice) indicates towards the method of checking the state of imbalance. With the scientific progress and technological development, man started utilising resources at a much higher scale. Large-scale (…)

by Ram Puniyani
The celebration of the Constitution Day (November 26, 2015) marked the revival of the debate, on, rather questioning of the concept of, secularism yet again. Rajnath Singh, the Union Home Minister, repeated the arguments which the RSS Parivar has been raising time and again. He said that the perverse use of the term secularism is causing social tensions. As per Singh, secularism is the most misused term in the country and it is this misuse of the term which is causing (…)