2023

by Ajailiu Niumai *
How can we negotiate for peace in Manipur in the aftermath of brutal violence that has left thousands of people homeless, 1,700 houses burnt, 221 churches and numerous vehicles burnt, 72 people including women and children were killed, thousands still suffers from traumatic experiences, hundreds of people in the relief camps, and 35,000 people internally displaced? An internet connection was shut off and curfew was imposed. The conflict between the Meitei and Kuki (…)

by Girija K S *
The people of Karnataka have once again proved that the political parties cannot take them for a ride and fool them. Their support in bringing back the Congress party to power with a thumping majority has shown they no longer tolerate hate politics and would like to live in harmony. However, it’s for Congress to keep up the promises made by them in their manifesto and assure the people, they care for them. Implementing the agenda as mentioned in the manifesto requires a lot (…)

by Badre Alam Khan *
Since the 2014 Lok Sabha election- perhaps for the first time - it appears that the Karnataka election verdict has shown that the communal narrative around electoral politics is now changing. If one could read and decode election results closely, it can be safely argued that political discourse has now shifted from the Right to Centre if not towards the Left. The majoritarian politics led by the BJP-RSS combined has faced stiff opposition and the communal narrative (…)

by Arun Srivastava
The defeat of the BJP in the Karnataka assembly election does not simply emphasize the erosion of Narendra Modi’s charisma and popularity, it bluntly questions the relevance and equanimity of RSS’s “Politics of Hindutva”, featured by Modi in the political system as the most effective device to turn India into Hindu Rashtra.
While Congress won 135 seats the BJP got only 66 seats, notwithstanding Modi’s sustained effort to use Hindutva to polarise the Hindu voters. For (…)

When Sri Chandrasekhara Bharati headed the Sringeri Sharada Peetam as its 34h Acharya, the normally calm and serene pontiff expressed disgust when a group of Hindus outlined a plan to teach Muslims a lesson. This incident is worth recalling in the immediate context of today’s Karnataka politics.
This happened when the Acharya, a man of vast learning, humility and renunciation, was visiting Tiptur town in Tumkur district in Karnataka. It was an area simmering with Hindu-Muslim tensions. (…)

by Supriya Bedi *
Some ninety years ago, a frail man with a walking stick made an impact on the freedom movement of 340 million people by showing them how to defy laws. Mahatma Gandhi’s Salt March, also known as the Salt Satyagraha, Dandi March and the Dandi Satyagraha, was an act of nonviolent civil disobedience in colonial India.The twenty-four day march lasted from 12 March to 5 April 1930 as a direct action campaign of tax resistance and nonviolent protest against the British salt (…)

A recently published book, Marx Dead and Alive: Reading Capital in Precarious Times, authored by Andy Merrifield (Monthly Review Press, 2021; Indian edition, 2023), has gone back to Marx’s Capital to address our precarious times: “Our own corpsed reality has depressed me so much that I vowed now was the time to get back to Marx.”. The author emphasized in this reading the unfinished journey of Marx’s Capital: “Marx never wanted to finish Capital because he couldn’t see how it could ever be (…)

Silence speaks! Or does it so !!
The recent exposure of an espionage case in DRDO — ( Defence Research Development Organisation) - which involves a senior scientist, Prof Pradeep Kurulkar, who was holding the position of Director, Systems Engineering Laboratory of the Research & Development Establishment (Engineers) within the organisation and was handling crucial projects related to India’s defence preparations has perhaps shaken the defence establishment.
As per reports he had (…)

by J.B. Rajan & T.P. Haribabu *
Abstract
This paper discusses emerging role of Local Governments, especially in the context of pandemic and climate change challenges. Local Governments always had the potential to actively involve in local issues but seldom given the recognition and opportunities. Taking cues from the involvement and initiatives of Local Governments during Covid-19 pandemic, authors put forth the need for second decentralisation in the country so as to enable them to (…)

The giant pharmaceutical company Johnson & Johnson has recently proposed paying $ 8.9 billion dollars to settle thousands of legal cases relating to severe health problems including ovarian cancer being caused by its talcum powder products in North America.
Health problems caused by talcum powder to small children have been a matter of concern for doctors for a much longer period in several countries, including India.
One part, and only one part, of the concerns relate to the (…)