Mainstream Weekly

India's Eighteenth Parliamentary Poll and the Left in Decline | Sukla Sen

Sukla Sen — 2024-06-21T22:18:30Z

The Year 2024
2024 is the year that is witnessing not only the still continuing Russian aggression, started in February 2022, against much smaller and weaker neighbouring Ukraine, in Europe, but also, in ever-volatile West Asia, the way more egregiously genocidal attack by Israel, inaugurated in October 2023 on the native Palestinian population in the region — Gaza Strip, in particular. It, however, is also the year when crucial parliamentary polls are held or being held or going to be (…)

- 2024

Emergency Raj to Modi Raj - Second Coming of the Nightmare? | Sukla Sen

Sukla Sen — 2024-03-09T04:31:57Z

[blanc][fond noir]BOOK REVIEWfond noir]blanc]
Keeping Up the Good Fight From the Emergency to the Present Day by Prabir Purkayastha
LeftWord Books, New Delhi
2023 230 pages Paperback 978-93-92018-97-8 Ebook 978-93-92018-58-9
__0__
The Context
The rather slim volume, Keeping Up The Good Fight: From The Emergency To The Present Day, by Prabir Purkayastha, having some 230 pages in all – that includes, inter alia, a Foreword and seven sections of the main text plus customary (…)

- 2024 / Book Review

75th Republic Day Marks the Traumatic Transmutation of "Democratic" India into "Hindu" India!? | Sukla Sen

Sukla Sen — 2024-01-27T00:31:34Z

A brand new state, independent "India", emerged — out of and covering a major chunk of the erstwhile British India — shedding the shackles of a century-old direct foreign imperial rule as the successful culmination of around three decades-long mass participatory epic freedom movement on August 15 1947.
On January 26 1950, it, in due course, became a "sovereign republic" and adopted a (dynamic) Constitution meant to embody the democratic, egalitarian and humanistic values espoused and (…)

- 2024

“Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam” Mother of All Jumlas!? | Sukla Sen

Sukla Sen — 2023-09-23T02:17:00Z

Unfolding of A Crime Thriller
"It's on August 11th, the monsoon session of the Indian Parliament had ended. The most significant development, arguably, being the return of Rahul Gandhi — by far the most visible face and audible voice of the anti-regime forces — getting his lost (or cheated?) membership restored with the help of the Supreme Court — his last hope.
The other claimant for the top slot is the eventual discussion on the continuing mayhem in Manipur which sort of forced the (…)

- 2023

Sordid Manipur Ongoings and Modispeak | Sukla Sen

Sukla Sen — 2023-07-22T01:43:00Z

The Background in Brief
In April this year, a Manipur High Court verdict, in a favourable response to a demand by the (Hindu) Meitei community — constituting the dominant majority in the state inhabiting the Imphal Valley — for a Scheduled Tribe status directed the state government to make a decision on the issue preferably within four weeks.
The (Christian) tribal communities, inhabiting the surrounding hill areas, took fright and protested. The All Tribal Student Union of Manipur (…)

- 2023

India: Lurches Closer to “Opposition-Mukt Democracy”!? | Sukla Sen

Sukla Sen — 2023-03-25T03:19:56Z

by Sukla Sen
While all eyes were riveted on the unfolding tumultuous scenes in the ongoing Budget session of the Indian Parliament over the unrelenting opposition demands for a discussion on and a JPC probe into the Hindenburg report concerning Adani group of companies accusing the group of brazen stock manipulation and accounting fraud — also specifically covering the alleged Modi-Adani nexus — and the persistent demands of the BJP MPs blocking proceedings in both the houses demanding (…)

- 2023

Indo-US Nuclear Deal and a Cock-and-Bull Story | Sukla Sen

Sukla Sen — 2021-08-13T20:18:30Z

by Sukla Sen
The Deal, it may be recalled, had been clinched - at the conclusion of a (tension-filled) process stretching over more than three years, back in 2008 October .
Close to thirteen years have elapsed.
Now - out of the blue, a cock-and-bull story has surfaced after the lapse of short thirteen years!
In quest for a lucrative appointment?
Knowing the influence that the Left parties wielded in the United Progressive Alliance government of Dr Manmohan Singh, China perhaps (…)

- 2021

Indian Left in a Pit: The Way Out? Prof. Achin Vanaik Examines | Sukla Sen

Sukla Sen — 2021-03-05T16:05:30Z

by Sukla Sen
Professor Achin Vanaik, to the discerning Indian public in particular, is quite a familiar name—both as a radical intellectual and an activist as well, especially in the field of anti-nuclear peace movement; is a co-recipient, with (late) Praful Bidwai, of the International Peace Bureau's Sean McBride International Peace Prize for 2000.
Prof. Vanaik, who had started his professional career as a journalist with the Times of India, back in the '70s, is intellectually, and even (…)

- 2021 / Book Review

West Bengal: 2021 State Poll - The Shape of Things to Come | Sukla Sen

Sukla Sen — 2021-02-06T16:32:38Z

by Sukla Sen
Introduction Four constituent states, apart from a Union Territory, of the Union of India are due for assembly polls in about three months or so[1]. All the four state assembly polls are, beyond doubt, pretty important — in their own ways. However, the West Bengal one is attracting special attention with the leadership of the Hindu nationalist BJP — the incumbent ruling party of India, quite visibly, according extraordinary priority to wresting the state from one of its, (…)

- 2021

Bihar State Poll 2020: Rising(?) AIMIM - A Boon or Curse for Indian Muslims? | Sukla Sen

Sukla Sen — 2020-12-19T16:19:17Z

by Sukla Sen
Introduction
In the just concluded Bihar assembly poll [2020], which had been expected to be a cakewalk for the ruling NDA [1] — despite the erstwhile third major partner quitting [2]
However, the last moment — rather post-poll, saw anticipation of a victory for its main rival — Mahagathbandhan (MGB) [3], led by Tejashwi Yadav, the younger son of once too formidable, now in jail, Lalu Prasad Yadav — at the head of the, regional, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), founded by his (…)

- 2020