2016

Kashmir is normal in the sense that there are no stone-throwing incidents. Militancy, too, is on its last leg. Yet, the Valley is seething with discontent. You can feel it once you land there. It is difficult to ascribe a single reason. Many factors are responsible for it. The most important one is the general feeling that India is all over, while Kashmir had given its control only over three subjects: Defence, Foreign Affairs and Communications.
The complaint is justified because it is (…)

by Sandeep Pandey
The defeat of India by West Indies in the T-20 World Cup triggered a controversy at the National Institute of Technology at Srinagar between Kashmiri and non-Kashmiri students. Some Kashmiri students have been alleged to have raised anti-India slogans and burst firecrackers upon India’s defeat. The Kashmiri students allege that the violence was started by non-Kashmiri students the next day when a group waving the tricolour and chanting ‘Bharat Mata ki Jai’ attacked a (…)

by S.N. SAHU
Nationalism has always been a driving force in uniting people and mobilising them on diverse issues. In many phases of history humanity has witnessed the use of nationalism as a fierce doctrine to arouse hatred and promote violence against nationalities of other nations and stoke war and violence. Europe and the rest of the world faced devastating consequences of aggression and hostility on account of nationalism which emerged in that continent in an intense form and became a (…)

COMMUNICATION
Water disputes involving two or more States have frequently become a source of avoidable tensions in India. One recent instance is the conflict which has emerged once again over the construction of the Satluj-Yamuna Link Canal (SYL) between Punjab and Haryana. Matters appeared to be getting out of hand and could be temporarily brought to some control only after the intervention of the Supreme Court. This tendency of unilateral action and very sudden escalation of tensions (…)

by P. Sakthivel
“The World Cannot Survive without Water and Morality Cannot Exist without Rains.”—Thirukkural (20)
“Anyone who can solve the problems of Water will be worthy of two Nobel Prizes—one for Peace and one for Science.” —John F. Kennedy
In India we have in the recent past witnessed water-related political, economic and social tension in various States leading to imposition of Section 144 in order to prevent any human conflicts. The water wars range from the sharing of (…)

by Michael Todd
On account of its preoccupation with efforts to develop strategic ties with the US and advance its “Look East” policy, India has overlooked the importance of the Eurasian region which is at the centre of the interests of the major world powers. Even though New Delhi declared its “Connect Central Asia Policy” in 2012. this was effectively placed on the backburner by the previous UPA Government at the Centre itself. True, present PM Narendra Modi’s tour of Central Asia in (…)

From N.C.’s Writings
In the midst of a general election, it is obviously unfair to predict who or which party is going to emerge victorious or be in a position to form the next government. This is doubly true in a situation facing us today in which no party can claim to win outright the majority of seats in the Lok Sabha. The absence of a ‘wave’ or a definite issue round which the election campaign has centred makes all forecasts mere guesswork. However, there are certain trends which are (…)

by Vikas Bajpai
The following article was written before the indefinite hunger strike by the JNU students ended following the Court order to keep the authorities’ disciplinary action in abeyance by staying it for now. However, in view of the importance of the points raised by it, it is being belatedly published for the benefit of our readers.
Even as I write these lines, the indefinite hunger strike of the students at JNU has entered its fifteenth day. The students there are demanding (…)

by RAM PUNIYANI
The issues related to our educational institutions’ patriotism started coming up to the fore with this government coming to power (May 2014). One after the other news of govern-ment intervention in different institutions, more so the nationally well-known ones, started disturbing us. There was the case of IIT-Madras where the Periyar Ambedkar Study Circle was banned. Then IIT-Bombay Director Prof Shevgaonkar resigned due to the high-handed attitude of the Ministry of HRD. (…)

by Prem Singh
At the time of the establishment of the Congress Socialist Party (CSP) on May 17, 1934 in Patna, under the chairmanship of the patriarch of the Indian Socialist Movement, Acharya Narendra Deva, two goals were clear: to achieve the independence of the country and to enhance the pace of the organised efforts towards establishing a socialist system. To achieve both of these goals, it was necessary to strengthen the true anti-imperialist spirit. At the first All India Congress (…)