2019

November 16, 2019 should turn out to be a day Sri Lankans would not forget in a hurry. On that Saturday, Sri Lankans will choose their next President, opting for either the front-runner Gotabaya Rajapaksa or a no-push-over Sajith Premadasa. Rajapaksa’s party, Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (Sri Lanka People’s Party, or SLPP) is so certain of a huge victory that their candidate’s and other leaders’ statements are leaving no room for doubt in their predictions. On the other hand, the United (…)

by Ram Puniyani
The RSS ideologues and leaders regularly keep stating that India is a Hindu Rashtra. This has been most annoying for the religious minorities, particularly Muslims, Sikhs and all those believing in the Indian Constitution. This Dussera, when RSS supremo Mohan Bhagwat in his hour-long speech reiterated the same formulation, a large number of Sikh organisations and intellectuals showed their opposition to it and at many places protests had been planned against this statement. (…)

Mahatma Gandhi’s spectacles are being used as an emblem for the Government of India’s sanitation campaign Swachha Bharat Abhiyan. Even though the Rashtriya Swayam-sevak Sangh, the ideological parent of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, abhors Gandhi’s ideology, yet Narendra Modi has decided to use Gandhi as a symbol for his drive for cleanliness. First, he knows that Gandhi is the only truly mass leader that India has produced in recent times who holds a national as well as international (…)

In July 2016, the State Government constituted a Committee on Education to study the system of grants and financial support to government and government-aided primary schools and to recommend measures to improve their overall efficiency. The Committee submitted its report last January. It has not been made public.
Goa has made significant progress in the field of education over the last 50 years. This is mainly due to government-aided and private institutions. Government schools themselves (…)

India is probably the only country to hail the

by Mubashir Hasan
The following message was sent by Dr Mubashir Hasan, a noted human rights activist and former Minister of Planning and Finance in Pakistan, on the occasion of N.C.’s birth centenary on November 3, 2013.
Dear Sumit,
An unfortunate accident is preventing me to attend the gathering in Delhi in honour of your illustrious father and my friend Nikhil Chakra-vartty. We had become friends in the early nineties when I became active in improving relations between India and (…)

by Kamal Hossain
The following is the paper the author presented on November 5, 2013 at the last session of the two-day conference held in New Delhi in honour of N.C. on his birth centenary.
I am privileged to have the opportunity to honour the memory of the late Nikhil Chakravartty, our Nikhilda. I remember him with profound respect and affection ever since we came into close contact during the early years of Bangladesh. His deep commitment to independent Bangladesh, and his wise (…)

From N.C.’s Writings
In 1967, that is, fiftytwo years ago, N.C. visited the Kashmir Valley for a few days and held detailed discussions with a wide cross-section of opinion-makers and political personalities of all shades there. On his return he wrote a series of pieces on Kashmir in Mainstream. The following is the fourth and last instalment of the series

IMPRESSIONS
Okay, so lynching is phoren.

by Rajaram Panda
The enthronement ceremony of Emperor Naruhito of Japan, formalising his accession to the throne, was held on October 22 at the Seiden State Hall at the Imperial Palace, officially proclaiming him as the Emperor in Japan. The Imperial succession had already taken place on May 1 following the abdication of Emperor Akihito, the first such abdication since 1817 and so the first in 200 years. Attended by leaders and representatives from about 180 countries along with heads of (…)