2019

by Zulafqar Ahmed
Politics around the world has been changing dramatically. The extreme Right has risen to power throughout the globe from Donald Trump of the US (2016) to Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines (2016) and from Victor Orban of Hungary (2010) to Jair Bolsanaro of Brazil (2019). The rise of the extreme Right is posing a severe threat to the democratic values like Liberty, Equality, Justice, Plurality, Inclusiveness and Tolerance, and with the emergence of the extreme Right (…)

by Nayakara Veeresha
The decline in global peace has largely been driven by changes in measures related to safety and security. (Global Peace Index, 2014) The Fragile States Index 2018 indicated that internal and external pressures affect the world’s richest and most developed nations too. Accordingly, Qatar, Spain, the United States of America and United Kingdom experienced social and political instabilities in the year 2017. The Economist Intelligence Unit’s Democracy Index (EIUDI), 2017 (…)

by Suranjita Ray
On February 28, 2019, in response to a review petition filed by the governments both at the Centre and in Gujarat, the Supreme Court stayed its controversial order of February 13, 2019— to ensure eviction of nearly one million Adivasis and Other Forest Dwellers from forestlands, whose claims under the Scheduled Tribes and Other Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act 2006, have been rejected across several States.1
The Apex Court, in its stay order, has asked (…)

THE UTTERLY CRASS AND VULGAR SENSE OF BUREAUCRATIC HUMOUR IN WHAT WAS ONCE BEHIND THE IRON CURTAIN
by Somdeb Lahiri
On June 25, 2008 I boarded a flight from Delhi to attend the Second International Conference on Game Theory and Management that was held at the Graduate School of Management, Saint Petersburg State University, Russia on June 26-27, 2008. I changed flights at Helsinki and arrived at St. Petersburg’s Pulkovo airport by flight number AY 0165 the same day. It is very (…)

by Mahi Pal Singh
The terrorist attack on a CRPF convoy at Pulwama in Jammu and Kashmir on February 14, in which forty personnel of the para-military force were killed, was a brutal, barbarous and cowardly act by an activist of Jaish-e-Muhammad, a Pakistan-based terrorist organisation, aided and abetted by the military and Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) of Pakistan; it needed and was rightly condemned throughout India by one and all as well as by the international community. The outrage (…)

While there is always the possibility of communal or jingoistic issues flaring up at the time of the election season in India, there is no doubt that development issues will also be an important factor. While the overall record of the NDA II Government in fulfilling its development promises has been highly inadequate, it is nevertheless trying to create an aura of great achievements and gains for the common people. The entire effort has been planned in such a way that just around election (…)

From N.C.’s Writings
Fundamentalism has become a much-used term today—in politics and in the academia. And there are in vogue various types of the so-called fundamentalists—political, religious and cultural.
But before cataloguing these various tribes of fundamentalists, it is important to clarify what precisely is meant by fundamentalism. The Oxford English Dictionary says the term, funda-mental, pertains to “the basis or groundwork, going to the root of the matter”. But the word (…)

by Deeksha Gupta and Anubhav Bijalwan
The practise of declaring the prime ministerial candidate by the political parties before the parliamentary elections is on the rise. The ruling party had declared Narendra Modi as its prime ministerial candidate in September 2013, much before the votes were polled for the 16th Lok Sabha elections in 2014. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had earlier declared senior leader L.K. Advani as its prime ministerial candidate for the 2009 Lok Sabha (…)

IMPRESSIONS
Prime Minister Modi had and will continue to have, the backing of all of India in his stand against the terrorists who “made a big mistake” in attacking the jawans in Pulwama. The attack must have given the Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) and its protectors in Pakistan a cheap thrill of achievement as they managed to kill 40 CRPF men in one go. But it was a big mistake because it made India unite against the assassins. Enemies have been shown that they cannot take advantage of India’s (…)

by Gouri Sankar Nag and Arpan Bhattacharya
Going by the recent socio-economic indicators, many scholars are now of the view that Pakistan, unless it mends its ways urgently, would soon be gripped by grave economic trouble. The fast depletion of foreign exchange reserves owing to the unbridled import bill and unsatisfactory exports coupled with the rising value of the US dollar against the Pakistani rupee might trigger a looming balance of payment crisis and compel Pakistan to go to the IMF (…)