Mainstream Weekly

Most recent articles

• India Inc’s Massive Bid for Power

  20 April 2014

  POLITICAL NOTEBOOK
  In the run-up to the 2014 general elections, India has witnessed an unprecedented demonstration of massive infusion of money in electoral campaigning. A sort of carpet-bombing of India’s voters with the Opposition BJP’s message everywhere to be seen, from advertisements in newspapers, on TV, on radio, on the Internet, on the street billboards in all metropolitan cities and small towns, including on transport vehicles (even inside the Delhi Metro trains). In effect it has (…)

• Modi’s Colossal Ignorance of History

  20 April 2014

  communication
  Narendra Modi, the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate, has earned notoriety for his colossal ignorance of Indian history and important facts.
  According to him, the ashes of Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, the founder of the Jana Sangh, the predecessor of the BJP, had been brought to India in 2003 although he had died in Kashmir while leading an agitation in 1953.
  At a rally in Rajasthan he came out with the incorrect name of Mahatma Gandhi, whose correct name is Mohandas (…)

• Hate, Desperation Vitiated Our Campaigning: We Need to Worry about Our Tomorrows

  20 April 2014, by T J S George

  IMPRESSIONS
  By all accounts this election campaign has been shriller, more aggressive and more hate-filled than previous campaigns. There were excesses on all sides. All players seemed driven by a newfound desperation. The BJP, emboldened by popular disgust with the Congress as well as by the impact of a dramatic public speaker, was on a now-or-never drive. The Congress, saddled with a singularly undramatic leader-ship, was fighting with its back to the wall.
  Provincial leaders, (…)

• Narendra Modi and Governance

  20 April 2014

  by Siddhartha Guha Ray
  The results of the opinion polls shown in several television channels give a clear indication that National Democratic Alliance (NDA), led by the BJP, shall be our rulers for the next five years, and Narendra Modi’s election as the next Prime Minister is just a matter of time. If the NDA under Modi succeeds to manage a massive mandate of the people in their favour in the Lok Sabha elections, 2014, then everybody is to accept it and this is the most essential lesson (…)

• Modi’s Contrarian Foreign Policy Goals

  20 April 2014, by M K Bhadrakumar

  The election manifestos of India’s political parties usually do not attract—or merit—attention. But the Bharatiya Janata Party’s [BJP] manifesto, which was released on April 7, whetted curiosity for two good reasons.
  One, the document was unduly delayed and curiosity arose that it likely contained such original thinking that the BJP, which is caught up in acute internal wrangles, needed to reconcile the content.
  Two, of course, this manifesto carries the imprimatur of the BJP’s prime (…)

• Moneyfestos of the Plutocracy

  20 April 2014, by Kamal Nayan Kabra

  Any attempt to make sense of the content and role of the manifestos issued by the various political parties would surely acquire a context for appraisal by means of at least a quick overview of the nature of the economic and political processes and forces which are the principal players shaping the main contentious issues placed before the electorate. It is a huge task but what we attempt here is to preface our main exercise by a quick overview of what appears to us to be the nature of (…)

• Uniqueness of the 16th Lok Sabha Election

  20 April 2014

  by T. Sadashivam
  Introduction
  The elections in our country, either for State Assembly or Lok Sabha, bring a festive mood among political parties (that may not be true for the majority of Indians). Nonetheless, elections bring voting rights in the hands of the common people to elect their representatives, who will in turn govern them. In the first Lok Sabha election, which was held in 1951, the total electorate was 17.32 crores, which increased to an electorate of 81.5 crores at present (…)

• Not Sorrow but Atonement

  20 April 2014, by Nikhil Chakravartty

  From N.C.’s Writings
  The following piece, which was published as ‘Political Notebook’ in Mainstream (December 12, 1992), is being reproduced now as the demolition of the Babri Masjid on December 6, 1992 has assumed a crucial role in the wake of the majoritarian offensive in the campaign for the Lok Sabha polls.
  The vandalism that brought down the Babri Masjid structure on December 6 will remain a Black Sunday in the annals of independent India. Like the insensate violence of fratricidal (…)

• Demolition of Pluralism

  20 April 2014, by Kuldip Nayar

  I may question the timing, practically on the eve of polling for the Lok Sabha election, of the disclosure of conspiracy behind the demolition of the Babri Majid at Ayodhya in 1992. I do not know how this has helped the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) at the polls during which it shed the development factor and came out in true colours, the pro-Hindu stance. Its election manifesto is a bit accommodative on the Mandir and seeks solution within the constitutional framework. But the BJP remains (…)

• A One-horse Race?

  20 April 2014, by Uttam Sen

  The BJP-led NDA’s dominance in the media tends to create the vision of a one-horse race. But healthy skepticism can provide food for thought. For instance, that Narendra Modi does not signify what the BJP stood for and will not be for long identified under him with the nationalist Right which constituted the political axis with the Congress at the Centre and the CPI-M on the Left. The symbolism of the Right as conservative, the Centre as a modus vivendi on socio-political status quo and (…)