Author: Dilip

I'm a scholar, writer and teacher; and my blog is designed for intellectual exploration. It carries no advertisements and requires no cash subscription

Vijender Singh to return Khel Ratna if protesting farmers’ demands not met // Farmers respond: Farmer Protests Delhi | किसान आंदोलन & Godi Media

Vijender Singh, who won a bronze medal at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, said on Sunday that he will return his Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna award if the demands of the protesting farmers at the Delhi border aren’t fulfilled. The talks between the union government and the representatives of farmer unions remained inconclusive on Saturday after… Read More Vijender Singh to return Khel Ratna if protesting farmers’ demands not met // Farmers respond: Farmer Protests Delhi | किसान आंदोलन & Godi Media

Dilip

Matthew Rozsa: This Marxist philosopher foresaw the rise of Trumpism more than 80 years ago

His name was Walter Benjamin; born to a Jewish family in Berlin, Benjamin was present for a pivotal moment in history, and watched Hitler rise to power. By the time he wrote his most famous essay, he was an exile living in France amidst financial hardships, having recognized that the Reichstag fire three years earlier… Read More Matthew Rozsa: This Marxist philosopher foresaw the rise of Trumpism more than 80 years ago

Dilip

Lucknow: families give consent but cops stop interfaith wedding // UP villagers allege the police forced the so-called 'love jehad' arrest

POLICE STOPPED an interfaith wedding in Lucknow, citing the newly passed Uttar Pradesh Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Ordinance, 2020, after receiving complaints from Hindu outfits. The police intervened on the day of the wedding, despite consent of the families of the Hindu bride and Muslim bridegroom to it. The wedding was to take… Read More Lucknow: families give consent but cops stop interfaith wedding // UP villagers allege the police forced the so-called 'love jehad' arrest

Dilip

SUNIL KASHYAP – "When those in power get arrogant, they lose:” UP farmers to join protests

At around 8 pm on 2 December, Narendra Rana came home to find a police vehicle parked outside his house in Doghat village of western Uttar Pradesh’s Baghpat district. Rana is a leader of the Kisan Adhikar Andolan, a farmers’ organisation, and he had spent the day travelling the villages of Baghpat and mobilising farmers… Read More SUNIL KASHYAP – "When those in power get arrogant, they lose:” UP farmers to join protests

Dilip

Jack Guy: Spectacular eight-mile frieze of Ice Age beasts found in Amazon rainforest

Thousands of rock art pictures depicting huge Ice Age creatures such as mastodons have been revealed by researchers in the Amazon rainforest. The paintings were probably made around 11,800 to 12,600 years ago, according to a press release from researchers at Britain’s University of Exeter. The paintings are set over three different rock shelters, with the largest, known… Read More Jack Guy: Spectacular eight-mile frieze of Ice Age beasts found in Amazon rainforest

Dilip

Indian police use violence as a shortcut to justice. It's the poorest who bear the scars. By Mohit Rao

It was minutes into India’s Independence Day when police stormed a slum in the western state of Gujarat where Hira Bajania, 65, was sleeping. In the black of night, he was dragged from his home, taken to a nearby police station and accused, with 11 other men, of stealing cell phones. As dawn broke on… Read More Indian police use violence as a shortcut to justice. It's the poorest who bear the scars. By Mohit Rao

Dilip

Tom Engelhardt: The History of the Decline and Fall of the American Empire Or What It Means to Fall on a Failing Planet

As in Election Campaign 2016, Donald Trump isn’t the cause but a symptom (though what a symptom!) of an American world going down. Then as now, he somehow gathered into his one-and-only self so many of the worst impulses of a country that, in this century, found itself eternally at war not just with Afghans… Read More Tom Engelhardt: The History of the Decline and Fall of the American Empire Or What It Means to Fall on a Failing Planet

Dilip

New book by Sumit Guha: History and Collective Memory in South Asia, 1200-2000

In this far-ranging and erudite exploration of the South Asian past, Sumit Guha discusses the shaping of social and historical memory in world-historical context. He presents memory as the result of both remembering and forgetting and of the preservation, recovery, and decay of records. By describing how these processes work through sociopolitical organizations, Guha delineates… Read More New book by Sumit Guha: History and Collective Memory in South Asia, 1200-2000

Dilip