On the night of January 5th, outside the North Gate of Delhi’s premier educational institute Jawaharlal Nehru University, I tried, while balancing on my toes among young people pushing and pulling each other, to upload photos and videos of the chaos unfolding in front of me with no success. I was suddenly proud of my … Continue reading Internet Freedom Is Expected to See a Dip This Year (But People Will Find Ways to Stay Connected)
politics
VK Krishna Menon: The Man Behind the Mystique
A Chequered Brilliance: The Many Lives of VK Krishna Menon By Jairam Ramesh Viking (744 pages | Rs 999) IN THIS BIOGRAPHY of VK Krishna Menon, Jairam Ramesh rightly points out the irony that though Kerala considers Menon a demigod, he was against the idea of redrawing the state on a linguistic basis. Within … Continue reading VK Krishna Menon: The Man Behind the Mystique
How Sabarimala Changed Kerala’s Politics
The Harivaraasanam rendition by Yesudas in praise of Lord Ayyappa was one of the first devotional songs I heard in my life. To the teenagers of my generation who grew up in the 1980s, it was one of the most exciting experiences whenever neighbours and relatives prepared themselves to visit Sabarimala, which appeared distant to … Continue reading How Sabarimala Changed Kerala’s Politics
‘We Will See Redoubled Efforts at Infiltration, Recruitment and Weaponisation of Militants’
An alumnus of the University of Cambridge, Dr Radha Kumar’s specialisations include ethnic conflicts, peace studies and conflict resolution. She had served as an interlocutor appointed by the Government for Jammu and Kashmir from 2010 to 2011, and has worked in various parts of the world to bring peace to troubled areas. The 66-year-old author, feminist and academic has … Continue reading ‘We Will See Redoubled Efforts at Infiltration, Recruitment and Weaponisation of Militants’
‘Savarkar escaped because nobody probed how Godse got an Italian revolver from a Gwalior dealer’
Tushar A. Gandhi, the great-grandson of the Mahatma, is the author of the nearly 1000-page volume titled Let’s Kill Gandhi! A Chronicle of His Last Days, The Conspiracy, Murder Investigation and Trial. It is a product of years of exhaustive research into the previous attempts on Gandhi’s life starting from 1934 by Hindu fanatics and his assassination on January … Continue reading ‘Savarkar escaped because nobody probed how Godse got an Italian revolver from a Gwalior dealer’
Inside the Mind of the Indian Muslim Voter
KHALEED RASHEED FARANGI MAHLI, one of Lucknow’s prominent clerics, has a message for the people of his community this election: go out and vote in large numbers. Self-confessedly averse to interfering in politics, Farangi Mahli, a religious scholar of Farangi Mahal, an area near Chowk in Uttar Pradesh’s capital city that had in the past … Continue reading Inside the Mind of the Indian Muslim Voter
Will its Hindu revivalist past haunt West Bengal’s future?
DAILY-WAGE LABOURER Kinker Chandra Das from Kaikala village of Hooghly district in West Bengal is tight-lipped about his political affinities. The middle-aged man treats the question of whom he would vote for in the 2019 election as though it is a brutal assault on his privacy. He raises his eyebrows in disbelief. He isn’t ready … Continue reading Will its Hindu revivalist past haunt West Bengal’s future?
How WhatsApp Is Changing Indian Politics
JENCY JACOB, MANAGING EDITOR, BOOM FACTCHECK, RECALLS THE DAY Union Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman sharply attacked the opposition in the Lok Sabha for calling Prime Minister Narendra Modi a “chor” (thief) over the Rafale fighter aircraft deal. Jacob and his colleagues at their fact-checking firm joked that a “clipped video” of Sitharaman would soon go … Continue reading How WhatsApp Is Changing Indian Politics
Navjot Singh Sidhu: The Performer Unmasked
IT MAY NOT BE inappropriate to say that Navjot Singh Sidhu has a face behind the mask that he constantly tries to hide. Great comedians have talked about this professional dilemma. So have clowns and slapstick performers known for their frenetic pace. Sidhu perhaps fits into the last category, a sort of a Punjabi Jim … Continue reading Navjot Singh Sidhu: The Performer Unmasked
India’s Institutions Are Crumbling Due to Excessive Political and Corporate Meddling
INSTITUTIONS OR THOSE at the helm of prestigious government agencies going rogue has time and again put the Narendra Modi Government in a bad spot. A number of judges of the Supreme Court of India rising in revolt against the Chief Justice and hogging news headlines was an unprecedented event in the history of Indian … Continue reading India’s Institutions Are Crumbling Due to Excessive Political and Corporate Meddling
Ullekh NP 