2018

by Sardar Amjad Ali
I hope there may not be any noble soul to contradict, if I say the impeachment of Lord Warren Hastings before the British Parliament, beginning on February 18, 1788, was one of the most sensational and eventful trials, with the members of the House of Commons on the right and the Law Lords of the House of Lords on the left, ending after a period of seven years, though as a “failed move”.
The most celebrated and powerful speakers like Edmund Burke and Sheridan had (…)

TRIBUTE
With the death of T.V.R. Shenoy—Shenoy Saab to some, TVR to some others and Sir to me—Indian journalism has lost a doyen and a titan. Rarely have I seen a person more erudite, more humane and more unassuming than this towering journalist. He was absolutely free of pretensions and had many attributes which succeeding generations of journalists should try to emulate and follow.
Thaliyadiparambil Vittappa Ramachandra Shenoy hailed from Cherai in Cochin in the district of Ernakulam, (…)

No other fascist organisation, in the present world, can beat the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) in demagogy, double-speak and unabashed use of conspiracies. A leading Indian English daily, in the aftermath of the 2002 genocide of Muslims in Gujarat, candidly wrote that in case of the RSS, what George Orwell termed as “doublespeak” would be an understatement.1 It stands true always in the case of the RSS. So far as its conspiring mind-set is concerned, it was none other than Dr Rajendra (…)

by K.S. Subramanian
The massive defeat of the ruling CPI-M in the 2018 Tripura State Assembly elections by the BJP has led to diverse explanations and interpretations. Unlike the Communist Party in Kerala, which has frequently exchanged power with the Congress party in the State, the CPI-M in Tripura has suffered a massive blow after being in power for an uninterrupted period of 25 years. While the winning Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its ‘cultural’ wing, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak (…)

EDITORIAL
The swearing-in of the JD(S)-Congress Government in Karnataka yesterday has legitimately thrown up the idea of an all-inclusive anti-BJP coalition before the 2019 Lok Sabha poll and it is definitely on a “firm foothold” as has been highlighted in The Times of India today. The daily underscores that the coming together of the non-BJP Opposition parties in Bengaluru at the swearing-in of the H.D. Kumaraswamy-led State Government brings out the prospects of the “Modi vs Rest” (…)

by Ajay Patnaik
The following article has been written against the backdrop of the summit meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Sochi on May 21, 2018.
Key developments in India-Russia relationship
India has had very close relations with the Soviet Union, which continues with its successor state Russia. Today the relationship is called “Privileged Strategic Partnership”. The Russian vector also helps India to contest some of the negative (…)

by S.N. Sahu
Long years back, while replying to a debate in the Constituent Assembly, Dr B.R. Ambedkar had very thoughtfully said that Indian democracy would produce many impossibles. What happened in Karanataka, in terms of the Governor inviting the leader of the single largest party—BJP—to take oath as the Chief Minister even as the Congress-JD(S) combine staked claim on the basis of the majority of MLAs on their side gave the impression that the BJP would be able to manage the majority (…)

The following article was written before the latest developments in Karnataka.
Tactically the Congress has won the day even though the party has been rejected outright by the people of Karnataka which went to polls for the state legislature. In the process, the Congress has still managed to win 78 seats out of a possible 222 for which elections were conducted. The party High Command went into a huddle and instantly decided to provide outside support to the Janata Dal (Secular) which has (…)

by Sanjay Kumar
In Karnataka, what looked like a close election between the Congress and BJP for most part of the election campaign, finally resulted in a hung Assembly, with the BJP emerging as the single largest party. The BJP ended up winning 104 seats, while the Congress ended up winning 78 seats. During the campaign though the Janata Dal (Secular) kept saying it would emerge as the king and not the kingmaker, this hung verdict has finally resulted in the JD(S) emerging as the real (…)

by L.K. Sharma
In India today, one cannot talk of science, history or politics without a reference to mythology. Godmen and astrologers make their daily pronouncements on the TV channels. So, how does one report the emergence of an independent journalist in a sea of embedded media? One attributes it to Divine intervention to reform his degraded profession!
Sorry, this outrageous statement was designed to make you read this piece on Ravish Kumar, a TV anchor from India. In order to be (…)