Mainstream Weekly

On A Curious Case of the Indian Institute of Advanced Study | Arup Maharatna

Arup Maharatna — 2026-10-07T23:51:00Z

Fortunately or unfortunately, in this concertedly imposed global age of AI, which we all are virtually forced to inhabit, writing up a thematic/topical essay does not require its author to set out with an introductory section or a brief background discussion on the topic, or issue, or the institution to be dealt with – thanks to AI, which instantly delivers a seemingly cogent introductory remarks on damn anything on earth with just a single click or touch on the universally accessible (…)

- 2026

Evaluating the Evolution of Ideas and Ideals of University or Higher Education at Large: Which Way Now? | Arup Maharatna

Arup Maharatna — 2026-09-19T23:20:51Z

There can be little doubt that global higher education (HE hereafter), as we know it now, is in a flux. This has increasingly been palpable in a growing plethora of monographs written over several preceding decades, which grapple with what is often described as a crisis of university education or HE at large. Although this concern refers to a wide range of issues including curriculum, pedagogy, governance, finance, equity, and standard and their current trends, the notion and purpose of a (…)

- 2026

Odd recurring lapse by scholars in India | Arup Mahartana

Arup Maharatna — 2026-06-01T03:25:49Z

Letter to the Editor, Mainstream
As an aged academic researcher, I like to ventilate via your magazine/journal my one earnest appeal to the entire Indian social science profession and fraternity. In my fairly long career as a researcher in social sciences, I have observed one particular ‘trait' among the majority of Indian researchers who publish their field-survey-based empirical results without ever mentioning anything whatsoever about the date or period when the survey was conducted. (…)

- 2026

What Does Lowest Growth of Chhattisgarh

Arup Maharatna — 2026-02-15T09:33:33Z

Abstract: The paper examines differentials in growth of population between scheduled tribes (ST) and scheduled castes (SC) in two adjacent states, namely Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh (MP) in central India by utilizing published official information/data. Rate of growth of population has been lowest in Chhattisgarh in this entire region. This is found to be proximately due to a higher rate at which the STs of Chhattisgarh are both dying, fleeing homeland to other places for survival, and (…)

- 2026

Is

Arup Maharatna — 2025-07-12T13:18:28Z

Even the most patriotic citizens would seriously hesitate to disagree that India is perennially

- 2025

On Reservations in Higher Education | Arup Maharatna

Arup Maharatna — 2025-03-29T12:29:14Z

Abstract
The commentary dissects rationale and ramifications of a policy of reservation especially when it is coupled with relaxation in the tests of intellectual abilities and academic volition at the time of admission to higher educational institutions.
__0__
There was a time

- 2025

Political Economy of Mass Higher Education: A Warning Call | Arup Maharatna

Arup Maharatna — 2024-05-25T01:51:11Z

Unlike terms like ‘mass/universal primary education' or ‘higher education' which have been in global vogue for at least three preceding centuries, ‘mass higher education' is radically new and certainly a post-WWII notion. For example, global gross enrolment ratio in higher (or tertiary) education (HE) was only 10.1 per cent in 1972, but it jumped to well above 40 over next fifty years. Most people take this – so-called massification of HE - as a given (immutable) historical fact too welcome (…)

- 2024

An Anatomy of Research | Arup Maharatna

Arup Maharatna — 2023-08-25T17:50:52Z

The term, research, has of late come in tremendous vogue globally. Even a ninth standard school-goer nowadays refers pretty confidently to research as a distinct activity or pursuit. Indeed, it would hardly be possible to find a single literate person who has never used this term in day-to-day conversations and even casual gossips. A staunch admirer of the present times would surely view this as a clear testimony in support of the populist branding of the current age as ‘knowledge society'. (…)

- 2023

Affirmative Action in Higher Education: India and the West | Arup Maharatna

Arup Maharatna — 2022-07-01T22:00:10Z

Abstract: [gris]There are distinct indications that a persistent pressure for rapid expansion of enrolment or market or revenues particularly in the case of growing private HE institutions has fuelled and contributed to a rising spread, popularity, and reach of affirmative action in HE generally in developed countries. A considerable uncertainty prevails over the extent of realization or realizability of the purported effects of affirmative action in HE and of increased diversity in the (…)

- 2022

Has Traditional Higher Education Been Unduly Elitist? | Arup Maharatna

Arup Maharatna — 2021-04-23T14:40:48Z

by Arup Maharatna*
It is far from the case that those, who are in the habit of calling our present times in various teleologically smart names such as ‘age of mass media', ‘knowledge society', ‘virtual age', ‘post-truth society' or ‘age of fake news', are all very sure, or know well enough, of what exactly they are talking about. I am deeply sceptical as to how many of those, who frequently call our present age as one of ‘mass media', are genuinely aware of the havoc being caused by its (…)

- 2021