Tag: History

Ukraine: India refuses to take a clear position on the Russian invasion / Prominent Russians join protests against Ukraine war amid 1,800 arrests

NB: The article below is provocative. Readers may consider the implications. But two points need to be made about the author’s last few sentences. One, the phrase ‘Putin’s imperial nostalgia’ is misleading unless post-USSR geo-politics are examined carefully. Two, the world’s ‘liberal democracies’ don’t seem very committed to liberal democracy these days, and neither (to… Read More Ukraine: India refuses to take a clear position on the Russian invasion / Prominent Russians join protests against Ukraine war amid 1,800 arrests

Dilip

Kelly Denton-Borhaug: The True Costs of America’s All-Consuming War-Culture / Chris Hedges: Chronicle of a War Foretold

The consequences of pushing NATO up to the borders with Russia — there is now a NATO missile base in Poland 100 miles from the Russian border — were well known to policy makers. Yet they did it anyway. It made no geopolitical sense. But it made commercial sense. War, after all, is a business,… Read More Kelly Denton-Borhaug: The True Costs of America’s All-Consuming War-Culture / Chris Hedges: Chronicle of a War Foretold

Dilip

‘A flashy theme park’: outcry over Modi’s plans for the Gandhi ashram

Like most things in Mahatma Gandhi’s life, his ashram in the Indian city of Ahmedabad was simple and austere. Yet between 1917 and 1930, these modest white bungalows, set on the bank of the Sabarmati river in the state of Gujarat, were the beating heart of Gandhi’s non-violent freedom struggle against British rule and his… Read More ‘A flashy theme park’: outcry over Modi’s plans for the Gandhi ashram

Dilip

Book review: How Thomas Mann escaped to America and waged a moral battle against Hitler

Mann returned to Europe in 1952, never to leave again… it was politics that had brought him to America, and politics that pushed him away. The mind is always in exile.. “I am an American,” Thomas Mann said during a radio interview in 1940. If he sounded relieved, it was because he was: He had… Read More Book review: How Thomas Mann escaped to America and waged a moral battle against Hitler

Dilip

Special Double number – Mainstream, February 2022 / Om Thanvi: Photos of Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara's visit to India

Letter to the Readers, Mainstream Feb 19-26, 2022 Who are We A ‘Union of States’ or a ‘Nation’ | Karli Srinivasulu Remembering 2021 UP Panchayat Election Results | Bharat Dogra Silence Is No Solution To Evil | TJS George Lockdown As A Means of Controling Covid? | Kobad Ghandy Five State Assembly Elections of 2022: Scenario and Consequences | Prem… Read More Special Double number – Mainstream, February 2022 / Om Thanvi: Photos of Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara's visit to India

Dilip

Mauritius formally challenges Britain’s ownership of Chagos Islands

Britain’s ownership of the Chagos archipelago has been formally challenged after the Mauritian ambassador to the UN, Jagdish Koonjul, raised his country’s flag above the atoll of Peros Banhos. In a ceremony on Monday at 10.30am local time, Mauritian officials sang their country’s national anthem and the red, blue, yellow and green standard was raised up… Read More Mauritius formally challenges Britain’s ownership of Chagos Islands

Dilip

The Break-Up of Britain / The US today resembles the Soviet Union just before it fell

Because of the impact it has already had and because its influence continues to grow, Tom Nairn’s The Break-Up of Britain, first published in 1977, is the most significant book on British politics of the past half-century, even though it is not a famous best-seller. Today, its republication by Verso signals the post-Brexit renewal of… Read More The Break-Up of Britain / The US today resembles the Soviet Union just before it fell

Dilip

Rajendra Prasad’s Speech, made hours before India’s Independence

Rajendra Prasad, the first president of India, gave this speech on August 14, 1947, just before India achieved independence. Because his thoughts on non-violence, truth and tolerance continue to have an enduring relevance today.    At this crucial juncture in our history, when after years and years of struggle, we are finally going to hold the… Read More Rajendra Prasad’s Speech, made hours before India’s Independence

Dilip

Alfred McCoy: The Epic Struggle over the Epicenter of Global Power

Great Britain’s dominion over the oceans began with an historic naval triumph over a combined French-Spanish fleet off Spain’s Cape Trafalgar in 1805 and only ended when, in 1942, a British garrison of 80,000 men surrendered their seemingly impregnable naval bastion at Singapore to the Japanese — a defeat Winston Churchill called “the worst disaster and largest… Read More Alfred McCoy: The Epic Struggle over the Epicenter of Global Power

Dilip