2018

From N.C.’s Writings
The prospect of a new configuration inside the Janata Pary has been advanced by the dramatic developments in UP. It is not just a change of incumbent for the post of Chief Minister that took place with Banarsi Das taking over from Ram Naresh Yadav, but an entirely new scenario for Indian politics with possibi-lities which only the blind can ignore.
Soon after the Janata came to power in 1977, the key development within it was the axis formed between the Jana Sangh (…)

Move over ambitious, egotist men

A new organisation was founded in Moscow on August 4 known as the International Federation of Kurdish Communities. It is a significant development against the backdrop of the surge of the Kurdish problem. Kurds inhabit several countries in a wide arc from Turkey across the northern tier of the Middle East to the Caucasus and Central Asia.
The new organisation is headed by Mirzoyev Knyaz Ibragimovich, a distinguished Kazakh intellectual of Armenian Kurdish origin

by R.G. Gidadhubli
On August 28, 2018 the Russian Government announced that the ’Vostok-2018’ (East-2018) military exercises will be carried out from September 11 to 15, 2018. These exercises will be held in Russia’s Central and Eastern Military districts, in southern Siberia, and the Far East. In fact this will be a major military drill to take place in Russia since 1981. This was corrobo-rated by Russia’s Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu who declared that this would be the biggest military (…)

by Rushda Siddiqui
The Jawaharlal Nehru University Students’ union elections of 2018 are over. The results are in and the country is witnessing something extremely historic. For the first time in the history of the JNU have elections been marred by days of drama and violence, and the country, particularly the former student community, is busy amalging the implications of the elections and the results. Now the issues facing the student are: how important were the elections and to what (…)

It is no less than a pyrrhic historical atrocity to want to eliminate the reality of a whole section of living people by refusing them the right to call themselves what they wish.
It is understandable that if and when asked, any court in the land would say official records should use the nomenclature

MUSINGS
Last weekend one news report hit to such an extent that I read it more than once and it also dragged along a significant offshoot.
Well, first the news report of Mexican investigators finding a mass grave in the state of Veracruz that contained 166 human skulls. In fact, last March, there was a similar news report of Mexican investigators finding another mass grave in the state of Veracruz where 250 human heads were found buried.
And with this in the backdrop, I sat wondering (…)

by Harish C. Sharma
I have come across an article in the recent issue of EPW on Agyeya’s Shekhar Ek Jeevni.It is a profound understanding of Western influences on Agyeya’s novel. It shows the commentator’s deep understanding of both Western philosophies and their impact on Agyeya’s mind and expression. The author in reference has worked on the writings of Agyeya who was, no doubt, first among the Indian writers deeply influenced by the Western literary aesthetics, fiction, poetry, (…)

by Monaem Sarkar
The trade war between the United States and its trading partners has created a number of downside risks for the global economy. So how is the global economy faring? How will the retaliatory tariffs imposed by the United States and China, among others, affect the global economy? These are questions that have been raised in recent policy discussions around the globe.
The US economy is on course to post another strong showing in 2018. The US real Gross Domestic Product (…)

by Duryodhan Nahak
Over the last four years, in a host of writings India’s new neighbourhood policy or neighbours first appears to be the dominant theme. Mean-while, India’s neighbourhood policy is essentially a continuity and change since the first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, who laid the edifice of Indian foreign policy in the initial years of India’s independence. Indeed, Narendra Modi, the Prime Minister-designate, surprised many by inviting all the SAARC leaders, particularly (…)