August 2009

As the number of deaths due to swine flu in the national Capital rises to three taking the total toll across the country as a consequence of the pandemic to 66 and India faces the worst dry spell in 91 years with about half of its landmass (246 districts comprising 46-47 per cent of our territory to be precise) coming under the grip of drought, the current political scene is dominated by disarray in the Opposition camp with the BJP, the principal Opposition party, in complete turmoil (…)

COMMUNICATION
In my article “M G Crops are the Highway to Genetic Holocaust: More Lethal than Nuclear Holocaust”, published in the July 4, 2009 issue of Mainstream, I had stated (in its third part) that
in the USA, the decision-making positions in FDA (Food and Drug Administration), which is the authority to allow or disallow the cultivation of GM crops have been usurped by persons linked with GMO producer companies. In India, how many among the members of the Genetic Engineering (…)

India has started its 11th Five Year Plan (FYP) from a relatively high basis because of much progress achieved in many sectors of the economy, thanks to the rising and pushing middle classes and entrepreneurs, thanks to reforms and a more pragmatic approach in planning, including the Private-Public Participation (PPP) projects.
The emphasis on agriculture and infrastructure, after decades of neglect, is highly welcome. To improve health and education is no less important. While the (…)

The Indian National Congress is back in power at the Centre. The small regional parties have practically disappeared from the scene. The Trinamul Congress party is a regional party and a shadow of the Congress itself. This government can safely be assumed to last for the next five years. The Congress has won much larger number of seats than all other parties and is the largest single party in the Lok Sabha. This government can safely be called a Congress Government, because the constraints (…)

A little while ago India had appended to its executive (a statesman with rare probity) signature to the ASEAN Agreement. I must confess I am a jurist but not an economist. But economics of the nation must submit to the fundamental jurisprudence which governs the rule of life and the state’s operations. On this basis, I consider the imperial economy which we liberated ourselves as a nation half-a-century ago to invest every little man in India with the right to life in dignity, decency, (…)

In our earlier study of Scheduled Caste victims in Uttar Pradesh we had drawn attention to the fact that compensation was regarded as the end of the case. [“Can Money Compensate for Rape” by Vasudha Dhagamwar, Mainstream (August 8, 2009)] We had raised doubts about the end beneficiary of the money paid ostensibly to the victim.1 We had noted the victim’s need for rehabilitation and we also had also seen the victim’s need for overall support from her community. The focus of our study in (…)

The Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, has described the Maoist uprising as ‘the biggest internal security challenge ever faced by our country’ as several States, like Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, are facing internal insurgency by Naxals and Maoists. The Maoists, in turn, have declared Dr Manmohan Singh as the biggest threat to the security of the country. While the Prime Minister has made it clear that the government will not hesitate to (…)

Three landmarks to cover in a single day—that was how some of us spent our fiftieth Independence Day.
The first of the pilgrimage was to the Indo-Pak border post at Wagah to celebrate the anniversary of the freedom at midnight.
Reaching Amritsar by the Shatabdi Express in the late evening of August 14, about a dozen of us led by the President of the Citizens for Democracy, Kuldip Nayar, we were received by a huge crowd at the Amritsar station itself—which included many (…)

Having lost almost all its wealth to the colonial overlords, the erstwhile Golden Bird was now afraid to allow any outsider to participate in its economy. However, a certain degree of liberal-capitalism was considered essential, and thus newly independent India adopted a “mixed economy”, in which features of both the capitalist model and socialist model were prevalent. The “mixed economy”, however, was not very well mixed, and had strong socialist tendencies.
The policy-makers (…)

Family is the most important primary group in society. Family and marriage are considered to be the two pillars of any society and as such they are the two most important societal institutions. In India, traditionally and from time immemorial, marriage has been hallowed as sacred; and marriage for most Indians is not merely a sacrament but is sacrosanct. Once the couple enters into the bond of marriage, the relationship is considered perpetual—till death does them apart. In other words, (…)