2016

It has been a time of test for the judiciary. When the political system is in a crisis, pressures increase upon the judiciary in the sense that conflicts to which the political system gives rise or is unable to contain assume a juridical form and become subjects for adjudication. The Internal Emergency declared in June 1975 was one such time when the judiciary was resorted to by way of habeas corpus petitions filed on behalf of many who had been “preventively” detained. The High Courts did (…)

Introduction
All budgets are not only economic but also political instruments for the party in power. The Union Budget 2016-17 is no exception. Its message is that the NDA Government is strongly in favour of the marginalised sections. Expendi-tures are planned at Rs 19,78,060 crores or 13.1 per cent of the GDP projected to be Rs 150,65,010 crores in 2016-17. This per cent has declined since 2009-10 from a peak of 15.8 per cent. Interestingly the Fiscal Deficit and Revenue Deficit have also (…)

Even though the neoliberal dispensation has collapsed all over the world, its votaries in the corridors of power in India are behaving like the proverbial boy on the burning deck. They believe in the mantra of TINA (there is no alternative). It becomes quite obvious by casting even a cursory glance on the cover of Economic 2015-16, placed in the two Houses of Parliament on March 15. It, in the words of the authors, “depicts the long and short run Phillips curves which highlight the (…)

From N.C.’s Writings
It’s like a political rope trick, Chidambaram’s maiden Budget as the Finance Minister of the United Front Government. Everyone from V.P. Singh and Somnath Chatterjee to the captains of the corporate giants have praised it and the Finance Minister coiuld go home in peace, as he has been anointed by the media as “Thiruvallu-var’s Disciple”. Indeed a long way that the young politician has travelled from the day when he promptly quit as the Commerce Minister to avoid being (…)

To
Prof Girish Chandra Tripathi
Vice-Chancellor,
Banaras Hindu University,
Varanasi — 221005, UP
Copy to:
Director, IIT-BHU, Prof Rajeev Sangal, and
Dean of Faculty Affairs, IIT-BHU, Prof Dhananjay Pandey
Dear Sir,
We, the ex-students of Banaras Hindu University, are writing to you to express our deep worry about removal of Visiting Professor Sandeep Pandey allegedly for his “anti-national activi-ties”. He had been teaching a few branches of chemical engineering and a (…)

In the context of the recent event at the Jawaharlal Nehru University to mark the hanging of Afzal Guru in which JNU Students’ Union President Kanhaiya Kumar has been arrested on the charge of sedition, we must also consider why the controversy over Afzal Guru refuses to die. Afzal Guru was hanged for his role in the 2001 Parliament attack case. But the Supreme Court admitted that there was no evidence to show that Afzal Guru was a member of any banned organisation nor any of the 80 (…)

There is a figurative way of attributing intense stupidity to an individual or a political party in the idiom, ‘He is own worst enemy.’ This occurred to me by the idiotic way the BJP Central Government has handled the recent student protest at JNU. According to the Students’ Union, a meeting was held in the campus by some outsiders wherein slogans favouring Afzal Guru were raised by them. Students maintain that they condemned these slogans and they cannot be blamed. In the normal course the (…)

The nature of the second BJP Government under Narendra Modi is getting exposed by the day. The object is to subvert the Constitution which declares India to be a ‘socialist secular democratic’ republic. Those who took office by swearing by the Constitution are, day in and day out, denigrating the ideals of socialism, secularism and democracy. The entire Sangh Parivar, with all its affiliated bodies, is at it. What is more regrettable and insidious is the role a powerful section of the (…)

IMPRESSIONS
For the crying babies of Haryana, the promise of milk was not enough. They kept crying violently for the actual delivery of their elixir. The inexperienced State Government was too scared to do anything, bringing Delhi into the picture. Originally meant to ensure social justice, reservations have become too hot even for Delhi to handle, for Haryana’s Jats inspired Rajasthan’s Rajputs to go on the war path. When Jats and Rajputs rise, can Marathas be far behind? Looming over (…)

The annual meeting of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), which is the successor organisation to the Soviet-era KGB is an important occasion to take the temperature in the ‘East-West’ relations. (The Cold War cliche is becoming useful once again.) President Vladimir Putin’s customary address at the FSB meeting was the hallmark of the occasion on February 25 in Moscow.
The sensational part of Putin’s speech was his disclosure that the FSB is in possession of definite information that (…)