2018

by Arun Kumar
The new data on the GDP have raised a political storm, with the back series for GDP growth since 1993-94 becoming available. Its importance lies in the fact that in 2015, a new series was announced which showed India’s GDP growing faster than the earlier series had shown. This was politically advantageous to the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) Government which came to power in 2014.
The NDA claimed that the second United Progressive Alliance (UPA II) Government had (…)

Three things stand out in the remarks made by the Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, on Tuesday (August 28) in the context of Russia’s forthcoming Vostok-2018 military exercise in the Trans-Baikal Region in East Siberia during September 11-15.
At the obvious level, Peskov was speaking from the picturesque southwestern city of Omsk where he was accompanying President Vladimir Putin. Nothing that Peskov says can be unintentional and his remarks from Omsk carried added resonance, because he (…)

by L.K. Sharma
Naipaul always felt that his books would stand the test of time. But which of his books on India, after multiple visits to his ancestral land, will stand that test?
Naipaul was obsessed with the idea of exile. His composite hero is a quintessential exile and most of his books reflect continuity. His ancestors came from India. He grew up in Trinidad, spent his life in England and experienced double exile. The scattering of the people from their original homes fascinated (…)

IMPRESSIONS
How many will learn how many lessons from the floods that devastated Kerala and Kodagu? The most important lesson is bound to go unlearned—that, ultimately, these were again examples of nature collapsing under the impact of human greed. We were warned of it five years ago when cloudbursts and landslides turned Uttarakhand upside down, killing nearly 6000 people.
It was adjudged a man-made disaster with hydroelectric dams, illegal mining and construction activities upsetting (…)

From N.C.’s Writings
Last month was observed the thirtieth death anniversary of General Zia-ul-Haq, Pakistan’s third military dictator, who was killed in an air crash in that country in August 1988. Despite the repeated anti-US demonstrations in Pakistan today, the fact is that General Zia happened to be “an indispensable factor in the Pentagon’s scheme of things”, as noted in this incisive editorial N.C. had written on August 17, 1988 (it was published in the August 20, 1988 issue of (…)

The following statement was issued on August 31, 2018 by the New Socialist Initiative (NSI) on the recent arrests of human rights defenders and public intellectuals.
The New Socialist Initiative strongly condemns the arbitrary and malicious manner in which the Pune Police, at the behest of its saffron masters, raided the houses of leading human rights activists, lawyers, professors and poets in different cities simultaneously and arrested five of them—Sudha Bharadwaj, Gautam Navlakha, Arun (…)

After the conclusion of the “Bangladesh War” on December 16, 1971 it was decided through diplomatic channels that post-War talks would be held over June 30 and July 2 between Mrs Gandhi and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto who had become the President of a wobbly civilian government in Pakistan and their respective top Ministers and officials. Mrs Gandhi had with her, Foreign Minister Swaran Singh, D.P. Dhar, Chairman, Policy Planning Committee in the Ministry of External Affairs with the rank of a (…)

by Sandeep Pandey
Matre Sadan, on the banks of river Ganga, is no ordinary Ashram in Haridwar and Swami Gyan Swaroop Sanand, fasting since June 22, 2018, demanding a law for conservation of the Ganga, is no ordinary sadhu. Earlier Swamis Shivanand, head priest of the Ashram, his disciples Nigmanand, Dayanand, Yajnanand and Purnanand have observed long fasts to prevent illegal mining in Ganga in Haridwar. Nigmanand died on the 115th day of his fast in 2011 after he was poisoned with (…)

COMMUNICATION
Swami Sanand (formerly Prof G.D. Aggrawal) has been on an indefinite fast in Haridwar and Rishikesh (Uttarakhand) on issues relating to protection of the Ganga river for two months since June 22. His main concern centres on the legislation for protection of the Ganga river along the lines of a draft bill which was prepared sometime back by an officially constituted committee within the framework of the norms of government functioning. Although he is a saint, all of his (…)

by Ravindra Sharma
Merely a month-and-a-half ago, elections were held in Pakistan (July 25). As the political dust of elections has almost settled, one seeks to analyse the outcome of the elections with an open and fresh mind. While cricketer-turned-political leader Imran khan was eloquently busy to take oath as the 22nd Prime Minster of Pakistan, India lost two important personalities. The first, a liberal Hindu leader, A.B. Vajpayee who ruled over India (in 1998 and 1999-2004), and the (…)