2018

by D. M. Diwakar
A Budget for a government is a tool of resource generation for public expenditure and reflection of an indicative direction for fiscal and development policies. During the last four budgets of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA-II) regime, the government has made a few significant changes in the Budget structure, such as, abolition of Plan and non-Plan heads of the Budget, merging the Rail Budget into the main Budget, realignments of heads of expenditures, (…)

by Irfan Engineer
Secularism is once again being debated after the five-member Constitutional Bench of the Supreme Court of India set aside by a majority of 3:2 judgment in Writ Petition (C) No. 118 of 2016 (Shayara Bano vs Union of India and others), talaaq-e-biddat or instant triple talaaq in one sitting resorted to by some Muslim men. The judgment is welcome insofar as it relieves Muslim women from the misery or potential misery of instant triple talaaq in one sitting. However, this is (…)

From N.C.’s Writings
The menace of communalism looms large in this country today perhaps more than at any time before. With all the dire warnings being sounded repeatedly against the danger of destabilisation, the government so far has done very little to halt the advance of vicious communal hatred leading to orgies of violence in different parts of the country. It is amazing that while the Prime Minister concedes that there has been a deterioration in the communal situation—as he did at (…)

by Navneet Sharma and Anamica
“The film which distorts facts and disrespects ‘Rashtra Mata’ will not be allowed to screen...”
—Shivraj Singh Chouhan
“In Rajasthan 47 per cent of women are illiterate, 50 per cent of girls are mothers by the age of 19, 51 per cent of girls are married before legal age, only 883 girls are born for every 1000 boys......Save the honour of Rani Padmini.
A WhatsApp message
“When a woman is raped, people say that she has lost her honour. How did she lose (…)

BOOK REVIEW
by V.B. Abrol
Life in the IAS : My Encounters with the Three Lals of Haryana by Ram Varma; Rupa, New Delhi; September 2017; pp xi-xxii+ 303; Rs 595.
After graduating in Arts from the prestigeous but short-lived Rajasthan College, Jaipur (August 1957-April 1962); Ram (Sahai) Varma went on to do his post-graduation in English Literature from Allahabad University, then known as the Oxford of the East. This was a sort of double insurance to get into the much coveted civil (…)

by G.N. Saibaba
The following is a letter received by Vasantha Kumari, the wife of Prof G.N. Saibaba, from the Delhi University professor now lodged in Nagpur’s Central Prison on the charge of being a Maoist activist. She decided to share the contents of the letter with the wider public and sent it to, inter alia, this journal for publication. The letter was received on February 13, 2018.
I dream of being in my classroom
day and night fettered behind
the strong iron beams
of my (…)

Asma Jahangir, who kicked the bucket last week, was a popular human rights lawyer and social activist. Although her work was confined to Pakistan, her example was followed through-out the subcontinent. The place from where she announced the foundation of the Human Rights Commission, an organisation to protect individual rights, also became the venue for meetings to normalise relations between India and Pakistan.
Asma would get girls and boys from India and Pakistan together at the house (…)

DOCUMENT
The following is a press release issued by C.H. Venkatachalam, the General Secretary of the All India Bank Employees’ Association, on February 18, 2018.
At a time when banks are facing the problem of huge irrecoverable bad loans and getting into losses due to provisions to be made from the profits earned, the PNB—NIMO fraud has come as a huge shock exposing the increasing trend of corporate loot of banks and thus, the people’s money.
Attempts are being made to dilute the (…)

EDITORIAL
Almost forty years ago the Janata Party Government in New Delhi collapsed primarily because the Jana Sangh component of the then ruling conglomerate refused to sever its deep connections with the RSS. It was akin to breaking its umbilical chord that linked it to its parent. The erstwhile Jana Sangh leaders, especially Dr Murli Manohar Joshi, conveyed that the RSS being a socio-cultural organisation, it was not involved in any political activity; so having any connection with it (…)

TRIBUTE
by Rimmel Mohydin
The funeral was scheduled for 3 pm on Tuesday (Febuary 13). On a regular day, the Gaddafi Stadium is about a 12-minute drive away. We left at exactly 1:45 pm. It was everyone’s last chance to see her. Obviously, the traffic would be terrible.
We got as close as we could to the stadium gates in our car, and then started making our way into the crowd on foot. The ambulance carrying her wasn’t too far away. It moved slowly, aware of the gravity of the woman it (…)