2016

COMMUNICATION
Whether in the context of the Cauvery river or the Narmada river or other rivers, so much time and effort has been spent on the sharing of the river waters. Isn’t it time now to devote more time and effort to the sharing of responsibility for protecting the rivers?
Look at how many details were worked out for sharing the waters of the Narmada river. The only concern missing in the entire elaborate exercise appears to be the protection of the river. The tragic consequences (…)

MUSINGS
Perhaps, for the first time in the recent history of Kashmir, curfew was imposed in the Kashmir Valley on Id. To compound the situation, connectivity snapped, if it was not hugely disrupted. The masses in the Valley cannot get over the latest round of trauma. Openly voicing their disgust, ‘Never before this sort of clampdown. Sitting caged on Id morning. No namaaz at the Jami Masjid nor at the Hazratbal or any of the big mosques of the city...you can’t imagine how upsetting it gets (…)

TRIBUTE
by Chandrasekhar Bhattacharjee
It was a scorching summer noon of mid-April, 2010. Mahasweta Devi landed at Birsa Munda Airport, Ranchi, from Delhi after receiving the Manavata Bikash Award, conferred by the IIPM. She was trying to find a statue of Birsa within the airport, but in vein.
A wellbuilt middle-aged person (Mahasweta called him ’Lalji’) received her at the airport. As the car comes out of the airport, a huge statue of Birsa at Birsa Munda Chowk greets her. The (…)

TRIBUTE
by Nirupam Hazra
I met Mahasweta Devi when I was a student at Visva Bharati. It was my first interaction with her. In an informal gathering at a tribal village near Santiniketan, she was talking to a young tribal girl. She was so engrossed in conversation that she was quite oblivious of the the people around her. When the conversation ended she turned back, smiled at me and asked in Bengali: ‘bhalo aacho?’ (literal English equivalent will be ‘are you doing well?’) I was surprised (…)

To you the universe Was a constellation of stars Towards which you took a leap, Only some of the stars Were shrouded in a darkness, so deep. You went close, you felt deeply, And in your manner so intense, Arose the speech of ants, Within a sentence; The sound of snails speaking, The torment of a hungry child, weeping. You discarded the middle-class morality of the Bengali bhadralok For the mud huts of the Sabar tribes of Purulia, And from them arose the words of Dopdi, Defying the cop who (…)

by Mark Weisbrot
The following article appeared before Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff’s final impeachment and removal from power. This write-up gives a fairly detailed analysis of the crisis in Brazil today.
On April 17, the Brazilian Lower House of Congress voted to impeach President Dilma Rousseff, who was elected in 2010 and re-elected at the end of 2014. It was a garish spectacle, with one Right-wing deputy dedicating his vote to the Colonel who headed a torture unit during the (…)

While dealing about the Naga problem, I wrote in a previous article that one of the most important political parties of the Nagas, the NSCN (IM), is a fascist party by nature. I failed in my efforts as an anthropologist to define the reasons for such a state. The Nagas by themselves are a peaceful society and even during the head-hunting days the raids were negotiated and pre-announced. I have myself received utmost love, care and supreme hospitality even in villages where I was a complete (…)

IMPRESSIONS
When Anna Hazare disowned Arvind Kejriwal, it was clear that all was not well with the Aam Aadmi Party experiment. When Kejriwal summarily dismissed his original team-mates, Prashant Bhushan and Yogendra Yadav, the AAP’s intentions and directions came under a big cloud. Then Kejriwal’s chosen faithfuls began showing signs of absurdity: Minister Somnath Bharti raided and roundly attacked African women resident in Delhi; publicity-hungry court poet Kumar Biswas exposed his (…)

by Deepti Priya Mehrotra
The Manipuri people’s struggle against the AFSPA holds that this counter-insurgency law has created more unrest in the State than it has curbed. The anti-AFSPA movement is raising issues of justice, accountability, and fundamental rights to life and liberty, all critical to the future —and indeed present functioning—of Indian democracy.
Irom Sharmila is the visible face of the anti-AFSPA movement: her sixteen-year long fast helped create worldwide public (…)

BOOK REVIEW
Mother, Where’s My Country? Looking for Light in the Darkness of Manipur by Anubha Bhosle; 2016; New Delhi: Speaking Tiger; pp. 250; Price: Rs 499.
Of late two very consequential developments captured the headlines of newspapers with one thing in common—the State of Manipur. In a recent judgment on a plea by hundreds of families in the North-Eastern State of Manipur for a probe by a Special Investigation Team into 1528 cases of alleged fake encounters involving the Army and (…)