Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• Rubble

  6 December 2015, by Gopal Gandhi

  You lifted one fistful of salt
  And an empire was shamed.
  Lift
  One fistful of rubble
  Now
  And pour it on our shameless heads.
  December 5, 1992 Gopal Gandhi

• In the Aftermath

  6 December 2015, by SC

  The mosque was eloquent History,
  Everything else was shrouded in mythology.
  Yet they, under the spell of fiery oratory,
  Chose to chase the mirage of a myth,
  Pull down the building
  And build hatred in their hearts
  When I, a citizen of this vast land
  With the pulsating impulse of History behind me,
  Watched helplessly in speechless agony
  My dreams lie shattered,
  My country split
  And its future back to the tribal past.
  I know not how to atone for my immoral silence
  For (…)

• Aamir Khan, P.B. Acharya, Gajendra Chauhan

  6 December 2015, by Humra Quraishi

  MUSINGS
  What tolerance are we showing for Aamir Khan’s harmless little utterance along the strain that his wife, Kiran Rao, had contemplated moving out of here as she feared for the safety of their child in this atmosphere hanging heavy with intolerance? What tolerance are we showing for the flow of thoughts, of words, of sentiments, of emotions? What tolerance we are showing for dissent—for the sane voices of dissent? What tolerance are we showing for arts and artists and for their very (…)

• Aamir Khan Episode: Wounds of Partition Have Not Healed

  6 December 2015, by Kuldip Nayar

  I was present at the function where Aamir Khan, a topmost actor, said that his wife had asked him whether they should move to some other country for healthy upbringing of their child. There was no rancour in his tone, only a bit of sadness. Still, his remark shook me. Indeed, it shook the entire nation.
  Never before had I realised that things had come to such a pass that even a person like Aamir Khan would think whether they should move to some other country. Lesser persons from the (…)

• BJP’s Rout in Bihar

  6 December 2015

  COMMUNICATION
  In the Bihar Assembly elections, the BJP, the standard-bearer of Hindutva and Hindu chauvanism, has suffered a crushing and humiliating defeat. This rout of the BJP, as has rightly been pointed out by Rahul Gandhi, the Vice-President of the Congress, is decidedly a defeat of the BJP’s ideology which follows a policy of communal hatred and which stands for implementing the RSS agenda of converting India into a Hindu country and establishing a Hindu state and which also aims at (…)

• Kerala: Cultural Sanitation and the Making of a ‘Hatesphere’

  6 December 2015

  by P.K. Yasser Arafath
  “To a Muslim, donating for the construction of temples is more sinful than extending monetary help to raise a brothel,” says a celebrated young neo-Salafi evangelist from Malabar in a video that has circulated massively in Kerala and the Gulf countries in recent times. His Hindutva counterpart in another video screams that “once Hindus wake up from their slumber, one will have to search hard to find a single scalp-cap wearing Muslim in Kerala”. Observing the flow of (…)

• India-Germany Relations: Natural Partners in a Globalised World

  6 December 2015, by Bharti Chhibber

  India and Germany share historical trade relations dating back to as far as the 16th century. Presently, Germany is India’s most important trading partner within the European Union. With India’s economic liberalisation in the 1990s, the bilateral trade has increased from 2.7 billion euros to 16 billion euros in 2014. In the first seven months of 2015, the bilateral trade increased by 13 per cent compared to 2014. However, there is a lot of scope for the two states to further deepen their (…)

• Afghanistan: Kunduz and the Deceit of ‘Collateral Damage’

  6 December 2015

  by Sonali Huria and Pupul Dutta Prasad
  On November 5, 2015, the international medical humanitarian organisation, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) or Doctors without Borders, released its Preliminary Internal Review1 regarding the devastating aerial attack by the American forces in the early hours of October 3, 2015, on its hospital, the Kunduz Trauma Centre (KTC), in the Afghan city of Kunduz. The attack led to the killing of nearly 30 persons, including patients and MSF doctors and staff, (…)

• Old-time NATO the New Dinosaur?

  6 December 2015, by Mohan K. Tikku

  Still recovering from the after-effects of the November 13 terrorist attack in Paris, President Francois Hollande followed his trip to Washington with a visit to Moscow on November 26. The United States, after all, was the traditional ‘Big Daddy’ of the Western alliance. But Russia had to be the new ally. The French President was there to seek Russia’s support in the collective war against the terrorist Islamic State, and President Vladimir Putin was promising it in ample measure.
  Does (…)

• A Delicate Shade of Pink

  6 December 2015, by Dipak Malik

  BOOK REVIEW
  A Delicate Shade of Pink: The Lives of Hella Wuolijoki and Salme Dutt in the Service of Revolution by Erkki Tuomioja; Wisdom Tree: New Delhi; 2013; pages: Xiv+375.
  A Delicate Shade of Pink by Erkki Tuomioja is a story from a distant corner of Scandinavia mapping Finland, Estonia and Sweden. The author of the book is currently the Foreign Minister of Finland having vast international experience. He is a votary of the Nordic welfare state and believes that the Nordic variety of (…)